Snape's Worst Memory
by Darkglare
Summary: Completed. The Marauders have more enemies than just Severus Snape, who's rotten luck is about to change. His friendship with Lily will continue past fifth year. AU, Marauder Era, SS/LE. M for Foul language/sexual content
1. Chapter 1 Greetings Fair Damsels

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

AN: Just getting another character in place to assist later in the story.

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 1 Greetings Fair Damsels

Regulus Black fought to keep a delighted grin off his face and the gleam out of his eyes as another victim was exposed to his cunning jinx. He just couldn't resist, even with every staff member and prefect on the lookout for the perpetrator of this combination of _Engorgio_, _Diffindo_ and thread rotting charm that had been cast on already shapely female students.

Regulus had been quite careful to cast it in crowded areas, where anyone could be a suspect. Although a simple combination of spells to shorten into a quickly cast silent jinx with just a twitch of his wand, third years were not really suspected. So many entered the school barely able to do magic, that it was thought that even those from noble magical houses were deficient.

It was also a great help that the heads of Ravenclaw, Prof. Flitwick, or Slytherin, Prof. Slughorn, denied that anyone from their houses would do such a thing. Regulus hadn't a clue why any red-blooded boy from Ravenclaw wouldn't want a glimpse of heaving breasts, but everyone knew how lazy Slughorn was. Much easier for him to deny everything until there was actual proof.

Unfortunately, all the girls were still defensively wearing their cloaks even though the summer holidays started in less than a week.

Regulus sighed with thoughts of nothing to look at for months. Perhaps another fascination charm on Sirius' mirror would keep him there long enough to starve to death this summer. Now that was something to look forward to, and wouldn't it serve him just right for telling his family not to disturb him?

It's doubtful Regulus would be able to trick his mom into bursting into Sirius' room again. How was he supposed to know his brother was really tossing one off, like Regulus hinted? Having gotten that right, his parents believed Regulus' original story that with all the grunting and groaning that Sirius was yelling out "Oh James" during the night. That may be alright for some warlocks, but not in the most noble House of Black. Although there were ways around producing an heir with potions and spells, Orion and Walburga Black were firmly against either of their boys not marrying a witch from a distinguished family. Everyone knew that any other arrangement was a reflect the failure of the parents. Let's face it, no one was blasted off the Black family tree for that yet – unless 'marrying a muggle' was a term to cover up that little secret.

Regulus entered the Slytherin common room comparing the indignity of bonding with another wizard or marrying a muggle. At least the muggle could have a pair of superb knockers.

Silence reigned with 5th and 7th years studying hard for OWLs and NEWTs. Other students were also studying, but the 5th and 7th years were downright nasty when it came to any noise or interruption. Regulus decided to get his books together to study in the common room. Flint may not have a face worth looking at, but she frequently sighed in a beautiful heaving manner while studying for her NEWTs.


	2. Chapter 2 Black Knight in Shining Armor

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story. Canon dialog used from OotP, Chapter 28, pp 645-648 in my copy.

AU LE/SS

AN: The variation of the worst memory

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 2 Black Knight in Shining Armor

Regulus was hanging around outside till the Great Hall was reset after the exams for lunch. Finally, a large group of students streamed out of the building signaling that today's written tests were over. He waited patiently for either lunch or for an opportunity to view one of the lovely lady's assets.

He was downcast as he considered the lack of ideal groupings and placement. A bunch of girls were heading over to the lake, but it wouldn't do to be the only male in the vicinity. Regulus could cast it over a distance, but what was the point of that unless he had a pair of omnioculars?

Fortunately, his brother and his gang of thugs were attacking someone so a crowd was gathering. Regulus sauntered into the spectators to see if any opportunity arose.

Sirius Black and James Potter had Severus Snape on the ground choking on some sort of pink foam that was frothing out of his mouth and starting to either come out of or go up his nose. It was hard to tell, but either way it effectively stopped Snape from being able to say an incantation. Regulus knew any attack on his fellow Slytherin would have to be vicious for anyone to stand a chance against him. Snape was not liked in Slytherin for his dubious blood status, but if anyone started something, Snape was sure to finish if he was allowed to maintain a finger on his wand.

"Leave him ALONE!"

Regulus glanced at the intruder, and saw all he needed to see. What a nice, firm pair she had, and weren't they begging to see a little sun on a beautiful day such as today? Mudbloods were good for something after all.

At least Potter looked like he agreed with Regulus' assessment that this particular muggle-born was worth an effort, as he did some sort of quick hair grooming with his fingers, and took on a much friendlier tone of voice with "All right, Evans?"

Regulus noted the position of Sirius, Peter Pettigrew and Remus Lupin. Pettigrew and Lupin were in the background, and perfect suspects for casting sneaky jinxes and charms into the fray.

"Leave him alone. What's he done to you?"

With a subtle flick of his wand towards Evans, Regulus waited for the show.

"Well … it's more the fact that he exists, if you know what I mean ..."

Regulus gave a steady clap with others cheering in support of someone finally having the guts to say something out loud and in public. Purebloods shouldn't be forced to take classes and live in dormitories with the filth Dumbledore allowed in.

Evans' first button went flying. After it hit Potter right in his smarmy smile, Regulus was truly in pain to try to continue breathing, keep the glee off his face, and the tears of delight from streaming out of his eyes. Evans did nothing to help matters by drawing in a deep breath of open-mouthed indignation which parted her school blouse completely. Her cheeks turned red mighty quickly.

Potter weakly said, "Evans ..." His eyes wide with emotion.

Using her left hand to try to close her blouse was ineffectual, as Lily angrily accused Potter, "You think you're funny," her cheeks got redder as she tried to maintain her dignity as she pulled her Gryffindor robe tightly closed, "walking down corridors and hexing anyone who annoys you just because you can -"

Potter, Sirius, Pettigrew and Lupin were all doing their personal definition of gobsmacked. Regulus thought Evans had a nice pair, but they weren't that good, and now that they were covered up, what was the point? What was worth the wait now was how Evans was going to use her wand on these four losers. Upset females could be very creative.

Speaking of creative hexes … the dopes had let Snape reach his wand. He aimed it straight at Potter, and a flash of light later, there was a bleeding gash on Potter's face.

Sirius yelled, "Oy!" as both he and James cast spells. Snape was hung upside down in the air, and his trousers were whisked away so his scrawny, pale legs and well-worn underpants were exposed. Regulus did not join in with the cheering this time because he was contemplating the implications of having that pair of spells so well rehearsed. It seemed rather unfair to Regulus that his little jinx to expose female students would be considered more humiliating by the Hogwart's staff than this underwear exposing combo prank.

Reacting to the applause around him, Potter asked, "Who wants to see me take off Snivelly's pants?"

Certainly not me, thought Regulus, wondering how twisted Potter was for even suggesting that this entire gathering wished to be blinded by such a sight. Snape with his clothes on was unpleasant enough. Rather than allowing his imagination to take charge, Regulus looked around for something more pleasant to show his poor tortured brain.

Lily furiously demanded, "Let him down!" Her wand now drawn, while her left hand continued to keep her robe closed over her still expanding bustline.

Potter readily agreed with a "Certainly" and flicked his wand, dropping Snape, who was still struggling to see something other than his black robes, onto the ground head first.

Sirius barked out a laugh, and flicked his wand while commenting to Potter, "Give our adoring audience what they demand, Prongs."

The remainder of Snape's clothing was now gone. Pettigrew's delighted laughter filled the awkward silence offered by the crowd as they noted scars, bruises of various age and size, a repulsive thinness, and a good flow of blood from Snape's broken nose.

Regulus sensed the shift in mood among the crowd as Potter then traded words again with Evans as he dared to ask her to go out with him, and his brother put Snape into a full body bind to prevent his interference. Everyone here now knew that Petrificus Totalis did not make a lewd display out of any specific body part, however that might not be a bad thing because there was enough visual evidence supporting the old hag's tale about men with large noses. The rest of the 16-year old Snape was repugnant enough to keep most from staring directly at him.

This could be the tipping point between a boring summer and a great summer, Regulus thought, as he saw Head Girl Alice Oakby begin to work her way into the growing crowd to find out what was going on. Too bad Oakby's personal Head Boy accessory, Frank Longbottom, was not hanging off her arm, he thought as he shrugged out of his robe, with the intention of making sure his brother was cast in the role of bully, pervert and all-around deviant.

"Oh my God!" exclaimed Alice, when she reached the side of Lily Evans. In disgust at the vacuity of the Hufflepuff Princess, Regulus shot his jinx at Oakby, then stepped forward and dropped his Slytherin robes over Snape's torso.

Sirius snapped at Regulus, "Get the hell out of here, you miserable toerag."

"Toerag? You'd think from Evans' calling Potter that a dozen times already that he mistook it for a term of endearment. Do you mean it as lovingly, dear brother?" Regulus quipped.

"I'll show you how ..." Sirius started while realigning his wand's aim to Regulus, when Alice's cry of alarm interrupted all bickering about the merits of being a toerag.

Regulus saw the evidence of why Frank Longbottom put up with everything Alice Oakby mindlessly chattered about day and night. Frank was one lucky man! And this certainly sweetened Regulus up to his new role as the dashing hero in this little drama. It was rotten luck that Oakby was also wearing her robes over her school blouse.

With Alice Oakby now being the center of attention, Regulus cast a hopefully correctly pronounced whispered counter jinx at Snape, before boldly jumping in front of Evans and Oakby, defensively posed with his wand with his back to the two taller girls, and in his best impression of a Gryffindor (or his idiot brother), he pointed at Potter and his gang, and declared, "How can you have absolutely no respect for a prefect and our Head Girl, you swine!" Regulus hoped this would leave no doubt amongst the eyewitnesses about who jinxed the girls.

Potter started with, "I didn't …," but Sirius drowned out Potter's protest with an ill-thought snarl, "What does it matter to you?"

When all Regulus did was smirk at him, Sirius continued nastily, "You don't care a hoot about them, Regulisp. You're just another scheming Slytherin."

Regulus just let his smirk turn into a smile because Snape was on his feet behind the Gryffindors with Regulus' school robe covering all his important bits. Snape's forceful _Expelliarmus_ disarmed both Potter and Black knocking them both to the ground. Regulus followed quickly with one on Pettigrew, and Oakby shot one at Lupin for good measure. Evans spread the love with four _Locomotor Mortis_, to prevent any more girls from being jinxed. Regulus was a bit disappointed that seemed to end the fight because he was sure he could goad Sirius into saying so much more, if he still had the ability to speak.

Since the winning team of Snape, R. Black, Evans and Oakby was so newly formed and with complete certainty was going to disband just as quickly, only a few young students applauded their victory. Everyone else was cautious not to be seen openly cheering since the Marauders' eyes worked just fine when they were in a full body bind. Many decided they should vacate the area quickly because Frank Longbottom was arriving on the scene, and he was in the habit of taking down the name of all present to use later as possible 'witnesses'.

Regulus did not disappear because he wanted to be in the midst of making sure his summer turned out perfect in every way. Smirking at Sirius would not be productive because Sirius was still face down on the lawn. Moving physically closer to an obviously embarrassed and barefoot Snape was not wise, but Snape's entire focus was on Evans who was still slowly and uncomfortably expanding from Regulus' jinx. Her robe had reached its limit, and Evans was now using both hands to keep it closed.

"... didn't hear it cast on myself or Alice."

"If it wasn't _Engorgio_, the reversal could botch things up even more," Snape said, while considering using his wand anyway. "Did you hear the spell, Black?"

Regulus shook his head, but then suggested, "It wouldn't hurt to do the counter to _Engorgio_ since Longbottom's going to send you all to Pomfrey nonetheless."

"Why should I go?" muttered Snape, before casting the _Engorgio _reversal at Evans.

"Your nose," Regulus replied remindingly.

A radically improved Evans chanted, "Easy, peesy, lemon, cheesy," grabbed Snape's nose, moved it a bit, and then added, "_Episkey_."

"I thought it was squeezy," muttered Snape to her.

"I'll give you squeezy alright, Sev," replied Evans, while giving his nose a twisting tweak before releasing it. She then quickly cast another charm to clean up the blood.

Regulus hid his disgust at the confusing display. Snape was not muggle-born, but he seemed to tolerate the mudblood nonsense Evans spouted without spewing forth his constant stream of verbal venom. She must be a top-grade shag. Snogging would not be enough for Regulus to put up with Mudblood 'lemon cheese'. Though it could be Snape was allowing it because James Potter's eyeballs were about to pop out of their sockets. Regulus considered this to be a big bonus because Potter was going to be whining like a little girl to his brother. Would there be long letters covered in tear stains, or would it be a constant exchange of plans for revenge between the two all summer? Might have to waylay some owls and find out. Either way, it would be good blackmail material.

Being in the role of defender of the fairer sex, Regulus was happy to inform Longbottom of the jinx reversal method so he could aid the Head Girl. It wouldn't do for Regulus to go waving his wand around in front of Oakby, and he wanted Longbottom to regard him in a positive light prior to Regulus telling his version of this morning's events.


	3. Chapter 3 Stand aside for a Gryffindor

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

AN: I've speculated that the Marauders have made more enemies than just Snape, based on Lily accusing James of hexing any student he wants in the halls. It's just been their luck that they've been encountered separately.

Chapter 3 Stand aside for a Gryffindor, Frank Longbottom

Prefects from Hufflepuff were only too pleased to escort the four Marauders into the castle. Longbottom, also a Gryffindor, instructed the four to go straight to their common room and to wait till Prof. McGonagall summoned them.

Frank didn't want to take any chances with them weaseling their way out of assaulting Alice. He saw the fire in McGonagall's eyes when she met with the prefects to brief them on the jinxing of female students. There would be no 'boys will be boys' nonsense coming out of her mouth regarding this. Those four would rue the day they picked on his sweet Alice Oakby, if Frank Longbottom had to make it his personal mission for the entire summer.

Remus Lupin may think being a prefect is a joke, but Frank Longbottom had a sense of duty that Lupin apparently lacked. The Marauders antics had been so bad when Longbottom was first made prefect, they almost lost him the chance to be Head Boy. Sure, Frank caught them loads of times, but considering he only caught them for a small percentage of their infractions, his record for discipline looked shoddy. This was his last chance at making sure his permanent record was improved for his Auror's application.

Having the basic gist of things from Alice, Frank did not want to waste anymore time outside with students still hanging around to gawk at them. Even though he knew they were mostly snickering at Snape only having a third year's robe to cover up, there should have been some amount of restraint since Alice and Lily were also in need of fresh clothing. Frank was annoyed that all the missing buttons were not summoned into his hands from the girls' blouses. The thought of creeps taking souvenir blouse buttons only made Frank's blood heat further into a roiling boil. He divided what he recovered between the two ladies for them to _Reparo _their blouses as best they could along with the straps of their bras. While they did their quick repairs, Frank yet again snarled at the loitering students to move along then commented with a nod at Snape, "We'll stop and get you dressed."

Frank took Snape's bag so he wouldn't be encumbered by more than keeping that robe closed, and led the group up to the castle. He continued to lead once they got inside and took the stairs down to the dungeon, heading right to the entrance to the Slytherin common room.

He addressed Regulus Black, "Stay out here with Evans and Oakby. We'll be back out shortly."

"We?" queried Snape.

"I don't want you to get delayed. Lunch is going to end promptly with the practical exams this afternoon."

"You are still a Gryffindor."

"I'm also Head Boy. Open the door, Snape."

After an annoyed glare, there was no further delay as Snape leaned his face against the stone and breathed the password. It was inaudible to the others. The stone opened, and Frank instructed, "Lead," and took hold of Snape's arm through the robe. To the few Slytherins not at lunch that were lounging in the common room, it appeared that Snape was in deep trouble as he was marched through barefoot with the bigger, muscular Gryffindor Head Boy attached. Rather than raising objections to the intrusion, they shared amused smirks. Snape would pay later once they found out how many house points the half blood had lost them this time.

Rather than standing around and basking in the humiliation of being manhandled, Snape headed directly for his room, knocked on the door, and receiving no answer, breathed another password into the wood of the door. Frank released Snape as they entered the dorm room. Unlike the uniformity in Gryffindor, a couple of the beds had different hangings with family crests in rich embroidery, feather beds, fancy duvets in sumptuous fabrics, and one even seemed to have a spare mattress on top, raising the sleeping surface about a foot above the level of the other beds. Except for the green coloring, Snape's was the only one that looked identical to the beds in the Gryffindor's dorms. Snape's trunk was pretty beat-up and had the words 'Blood Traitor' carved deeply in large letters on the lid.

In response to Frank's indignant noise, Snape muttered, "Something new would be written if I remove that so I'm not going to bother until it's ready to be loaded on the Hogwart's Express." He waved his wand performing a few charms before opening it.

Frank put Snape's bag down on the foot of the bed, and made small talk by asking, "Still got a lot of packing yet?" indicating the relative emptiness of Snape's trunk with a brief wave of his hand.

"Not really," Snape replied as he dug out pants, trousers and a shirt. With a pointed glance at Frank Longbottom, Severus moved to put the bed between the two of them before sliding his underpants on under Regulus' robe, then pulled on his trousers. He removed the robe to put on his shirt, and Frank could not look away from the emaciated torso that was so unlike his own well-defined bulk. Frank found the sight disturbing, and thought that the marks of injuries both old and recent showed how insignificant Snape was physically in comparison. It was fortunate that Frank did not see Snape's back – the area preferred for disciplinary correction and attitude improvement beatings.

Frank tore his eyes away and looked down at the still-open trunk. There wasn't any contraband visible, and considering that whatever lining the trunk once had been ripped out, it was probably a poor place to hide anything. The highly tarnished plaque on the outside claimed the trunk belonged to 'Eileen Prince'.

"I have a small problem – that was my last pair of shoes, belt, school tie and robe."

"School rules require each student to have three robes, Snape," Frank replied, quoting the standard uniform code.

"At the beginning of the year it is, and I did then. You Gryffindors are very dismissive about others' belongings." Frank rolled his eyes in response to the boy who had 'blood traitor' carved onto his school trunk.

Snape walked over to one of the other trunks in the rooms and briefly waved his wand. "A piece of Spellotape would be stronger than Rosier's ward." After opening the lid, and carefully searching and putting items precisely back into the deep and obviously magically expanded trunk, he continued, "Only grabbing a pair of shoes, Longbottom. He's got so many clothes, he won't notice they're gone. I'll even take a scuffed up pair," Snape declared as he held up the pair he intended to take.

Frank shook his head in disapproval as Snape got out a pair of pathetic socks from his own trunk, threw his bag in and then closed and replaced the wards. After putting on his socks and Rosier's shoes, Snape adjusted the fit with his wand and then headed out the door with Frank following.

Upon reaching the group waiting outside the Slytherin common room, Snape thrust Black's robe at him with a surprising, "Thank you."

Frank interrupted the return by asking, "Can Snape keep that another day, Black?"

When Regulus returned a puzzled nod, Frank then asked, "You wouldn't happen to have a spare Slytherin tie too, would you?"

"Sure," Regulus said, suddenly understanding the problem. "You can keep them both, Snape, if you want rather than giving them back. It's my brother's fault that your uniforms are gone. Only fair that another Black help get it sorted. Besides, can't have you losing points from Slytherin for not being in uniform for our last day." Slytherin was still in the lead for the cup, but it was so close that a point loss for any infraction gave Ravenclaw a chance to snatch it away. Regulus wasn't sure how he'd ask Snape to pay him back, but it would sure be useful if he was passing while Sirius was bullying his little brother in the halls.

Snape's eyes narrowed slightly trying to calculate if Regulus was up to something, but did keep the robe. He finally gave a silent nod in return.

"I'll get the tie to you while you are queued up for your afternoon exam."

Frank added, "And I'll get you a belt and another pair of shoes so you can return the ones you borrowed."

That caused another suspicious look from Snape, now directed at Frank Longbottom.

Lily Evans knew Severus didn't want charity or pity, but could only imagine the problems he would face at home with having to replace all his clothing. She hoped Severus would not spite them all by insisting on going home barefoot. He was so stubborn at times. Lily merely smiled encouragingly at Severus. More words on the matter would likely trigger Severus' angriness into insults to everyone around him.

Alice Oakby was assured by the reaffirmation of facts she already knew -

1. Frank Longbottom was the bravest man she knew. He walked right into the Slytherin dormitories.

2. Frank Longbottom was the most considerate man she knew. He cared if a trouble student had the proper uniform.

3. Alice Oakby was so ready to become Mrs. Frank Longbottom, if only the pillock would ask her.


	4. Chapter 4 McGonagall hears more than eno

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 4 McGonagall hears more than enough

Frank Longbottom (Head Boy, Gryffindor), Alice Oakby (Head Girl, Hufflepuff), Lily Evans (5th year Prefect, Gryffindor), Regulus Black (Slytherin 3rd) and Severus Snape (Slytherin 5th) went to Prof. Minerva McGonagall's office. Frank had already asked one of the Hufflepuff prefects to notify Prof. McGonagall that he'd be up shortly with his report about the jinx that had been cursing the school since the Easter holiday, once all this morning's victims were properly attired.

Minerva's face hardened to the point where her thinned lips were going to be aching for the next day at least. The list of insensitive acts committed by Potter, S. Black, Pettigrew and Lupin following this morning's DADA OWL was mind-boggling. Using a _Scourgify _spell on a person instead of an inanimate object, and with the intention to prevent the ability to breathe. Openly casting the breast-baring jinx on both Lily Evans and Alice Oakby. Completely undressing Severus Snape in front of a crowd. Spouting hateful talk about the victims and that they deserved it simply because 'they exist'.

Frank Longbottom efficiently laid out the facts for Prof. McGonagall. The details were so damaging that there was no need to elaborate.

It was hard being a victim of such a cruel prank, but Alice Oakby was thankful she had the support of her house, Frank and the entire school. What saddened her most is that so many girls had already been objectified by this cruel group of malcontents over the past two months.

Regulus did not have to do much except agree with whatever Longbottom asked him to. Longbottom was also considerate enough to point out that it was Sirius who was the deviant that disrobed Snape completely. He also enjoyed McGonagall's name for his spell – the Breast Baring Jinx, how sweet sounding. He could think of wittier names, but it was kind of funny to think of McGonagall and Dumbledore having a chat over tea about his jinx and having to come up with something to call it.

Unlike Regulus, Snape knew things could not be going this well. At some point, the promise that the Marauders might actually be punished would be snatched away. The Hogwarts Express would be taking them away to summer holidays in two days, and McGonagall wasn't going to cut into study time by assigning detention the night before the Transfiguration OWL. McGonagall offering the group of them lunch here in her office inexplicably blackened his mood even more.

Lily's thoughts were swirling about on a variety of subjects. James Potter was the biggest toerag on earth. Sirius Black was the second biggest toerag on earth. Peter Pettigrew was pathetic, and it was doubtful that a Slytherin prefect could be worse than Remus Lupin when it came to outright favoritism. It was mortifying that they cast that jinx on her. It was doubly mortifying that they would cast it on Alice, who was one of the nicest people Lily knew. And Severus … if Lily wasn't so angry right now, she'd be crying. It was all just so unfair, and there really was no line those foul bullies wouldn't cross. It may be good in a way that the holidays were almost here. Lily would have a lot of time alone with Severus for when he was ready to talk about today's humiliation, if he ever did. She could probably pry a few words out of Severus to gauge a little about how he felt, but Lily felt that this could be another one of those subjects Severus didn't want to discuss – like his parents and what actually went on inside that house. Knowing that they both had their DADA practical exam this afternoon, Lily handed Severus half a sandwich off the platter summoned by Prof. McGonagall. Lily couldn't tell from his dark glare at the sandwiches whether he was stewing over this morning or already making plans for revenge.


	5. Chapter 5 Hebridean Tartan Dragon

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 5 Hebridean Tartan Dragon

The Marauders jeered at the puffed up Hufflepuff male prefects that escorted them back to the entrance of Gryffindor tower. It's not like they jinxed Alice Oakby.

Sirius, James and Peter were in fine spirits as they entered the Gryffindor common room. Remus knew that the Marauders had gotten away with much in the past, there was not much time left for punishments and Gryffindor was not in the running for the House Cup for the loss of points to mean anything. However, as a prefect, Remus knew that McGonagall was keen to punish whoever was casting those jinxes, and they had been the only ones visibly waving wands in the vicinity of the victims.

Peter was busy boasting of their victory to everyone left in the common room. "And you should have seen it as James just let him fall to the ground _splat_ on his face," he emphasized with a pancaking hand motion. "There was a lot of blood, but his nose will probably be better looking now. It was so outrageously huge before – mum must be a real hag."

Sirius interrupted laughingly, "But someone must have been desperate enough to put a bag over her head, and do the nasty with her to get Snape."

"Yeah," Peter agreed with his own sycophantic giggle. "Then it was great because Sirius and James took all his clothes off. Totally starkers!" Peter started to choke on his own laughter, but got himself together enough to wheeze out, "And Evans … Evans … she looked at him like he was dog crap on the bottom of her shoe! Oh! Snape is just so ugly ..."

James agreed, "Absolutely grotesque! Great puddles of grease killing the lawn too." Mentally, he was smacking himself in the head - why hadn't he thought of looking at Evans, instead of that loser?

"Oy! I don't need to be reminded just before lunch. The vilest fish and chips can't compare to Snivellus in terms of viscosity."

"Viscosity?" quipped James. "Now where would you know a ten-galleon word like that from, Padfoot?"

Peter asked distractedly, "Are they serving fish and chips today?"

Remus replied, "I don't know but I'd love to see how Sirius measures degrees of oiliness."

James joked while wagging his eyebrows as he led them out of the common room, "I hope Padfoot doesn't use it for lewd purposes."

Disdainfully Sirius commented, "I would never use any fluid from Snivellus, or even fish and chips, for those kinds of things." He followed, along with Remus and Peter, to go check out what was for lunch today.

****************

The four were enjoying their lunch in the Great Hall. James and Sirius sat among their admiring crowd of Gryffindors, while Peter recounted their daring exploits at humiliating their foul, mortal enemy, the Greasy Git of Slytherin in another battle of their ongoing war.

"You'll notice he couldn't even show up for lunch 'cause of us," Peter crowed while waving his hand outwards towards the other end of the room where the Slytherins dined.

No one across the table shared Peter's amusement because their head of house, Prof. McGonagall had marched in and had just stopped behind him.

Her eyes flashed as she demanded, "What are the four of you doing here when Mr. Longbottom told you to wait in Gryffindor tower?"

"We were there, Professor," replied Black and he smoothly added, "He just didn't say how long we had to stay there."

"Besides," James said with a winning smile, "we got to keep our strength up. Got an important test this afternoon, Professor."

Peter nodded nervously in agreement.

Remus was the only one who let worry creep into his expression. James and Sirius' frivolous attitude was incompatible with McGonagall's narrowing eyes. "Very well, gentlemen, if you want to give me extra time to consider what to do with you lot. You will report to my office directly following your Defense practicals this afternoon."

"Sure thing, Professor McGonagall," agreed James sweetly.

McGonagall gave the Marauders and the entire group of Gryffindors surrounding them an angry glare before sweeping up to the Head Table.

Black joked, "Mighty big of her to allow us to take our test, eh Prongs?"


	6. Chapter 6 Discofox and the Serpent

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

AN – I'm sorry to put Bertha Jorkins into Hufflepuff. I'm sure there are brainless gossips in other houses, but Sirius did not give enough insults for me to definitively sort her.

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter Six – Discofox and the Serpent

Regulus left shortly after McGonagall, with a quick promise to bring a house tie to Severus while he waited to take his test.

Frank hesitated a moment to inquire, "Alright Evans? Snape?"

Lily thanked Frank, and Severus was polite enough to give a slight nod.

Frank then also reminded Severus that he'd also meet up to give him some clothing, then followed his adoring Alice out of McGonagall's office.

Severus stood up to also leave, since this was the Head of Gryffindor's office, but Lily asked, "Can't we stay here till it's almost time to take the test, Sev? Prof. McGonagall did offer to let us stay and finish lunch." Lily indicated the practically full platter of sandwiches and pitcher of pumpkin juice.

In response to Severus' momentary indecision and deepening frown, Lily added, "And I really don't think I could face anyone right now … after what happened."

His expression turned to one of concern immediately, and Severus sat back down in the chair closest to Lily. With a serious tone, he agreed, "Yes, it was horrible." Both his hands twitched a little, before he placed them on his knees and stared deeply at Lily and waited.

Lily became thoughtful as she looked at her best friend. It was better to keep him out of sight right now because the students at this school could be amazingly brutal, however she didn't want to lie to him. What happened to her was dreadfully cruel, but the treatment he received was absolutely inhumane. A wave of emotion rose in her chest. She swallowed audibly in an effort to tamp it down.

"Would you like some water or juice?" Severus asked trying to provide a distraction from Lily possibly breaking into tears.

"Uh … a bit," Lily replied, in an effort to get Severus to stop studying her. Usually he was a good person to talk to regarding anything, except when it came to emotions and feelings. Lily realized years ago that conversations with Severus were different, but she did understand that even though he was stunted emotionally, he had the capacity to understand more than anger and revenge. Those were the primary feelings he used to keep himself masked from the rest of the world.

"Do you think letters will be sent to our parents? Petunia's accusation of freak will take on a whole new meaning."

Severus handed a glass of juice to Lily. "Maybe they won't tell her, or give you a chance to explain it first." He then sighed and added, "I'd endure an entire summer of more discofox, if it meant Petunia not picking on you, Lily"

Lily laughed aloud at Severus' reference to the muggle dance that Petunia and her friends were learning last summer. Much to Petunia's horror, her girlfriends discovered that her little sister, Lily, had a boy round. Severus was not intimidated by the older girls into cooperating, but took perverse joy in Petunia's reaction to them even noticing that grubby Snape boy from Spinner's End. Especially since he was stinking up her mother's kitchen looking for a handout, and not staying where he belonged.

"You are not fooling me, Sev. Having all those girls wanting to dance with you," she teased.

Showing a degree of disgust, Severus defended himself, "I didn't like it, and the only girl I'd ever _want_ to dance with is you, Lily. Besides, it wasn't all that many. Petunia only has a handful of friends, and they just didn't want to dance the boy part. Except Tunie," he added with a smirk because she was the only one who wouldn't dance with him.

Rather than probing on how much Severus wanted to dance with her, Lily commented, "It's almost time for us to line up downstairs for the test."

Severus gave a slight nod, and held open the door for Lily. He was closing it when a snippy voice sounded, "Heard they saw the fabled Slytherin serpent outside near the lake earlier."

"Five points from Hufflepuff, Jorkins," Lily snapped at the 7th year. "Get to wherever you're going instead of hanging around here."

Lily huffed and glanced at Severus as she started down the hall. His head was tilted forward so his hair hid his face. She just knew it was the reason why he wouldn't let it get cut short and somewhat fashionable. It was embarrassing to think that all some people would look at is _that _body part. Lily did register she saw it, but her eyes were more on his sharp ribs and wondering why Severus had any bruises, when he was safe here at school, rather than in his parents' care.

Prof. McGonagall was monitoring the fifth years in the hall waiting to take their practical DADA OWL. Lining them up in alphabetical order, regardless of house, keeping them spaced apart, preventing talking, and even telling them all to keep their eyes forward.

Regulus arrived first, but sensing McGonagall's mood, he waited in the shadow of a stairwell till Frank arrived. Frank beckoned Severus over to a corner behind the others, with McGonagall's permissive nod, so that both he and Regulus could pass on clothing to get him back in uniform.


	7. Chapter 7 Never get McGonagall's tartan

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter Seven – Never get McGonagall's tartan in a twist

Sirius was done with the test, and McGonagall told him to stand against the wall until she was done. What the heck?

As time wore on, Remus, Peter and James joined Sirius sourly standing against the wall.

Once the last of the test takers entered and left her with no line, McGonagall briskly instructed, "Come with me."

Upon reaching McGonagall's office, both James and Sirius easily relaxed in two of the chairs, fearing nothing. Peter perched on the edge of a chair near the window, with the hope that McGonagall would not focus on him. Remus sat up straight and looked attentive.

"Two months of attacking the young ladies of this school! And you, Mr. Lupin, a prefect."

Remus replied earnestly, "It wasn't us, Professor."

"Oh really?"

"It was Snape," added Sirius.

"Mr. Snape must be pretty talented to cast spells while in a body bind."

"He wasn't in it the whole time, professor," asserted James.

"And he had help," complained Peter. "Regulus Black trying to get us in trouble. He's jealous of Sirius."

"There are plenty of witnesses that saw you attack Mr. Snape without cause. You tried to suffocate him, broke his nose, and then removed all his clothing. On that last note, I think it likely that it was you boys who have been jinxing the clothing of other students, rather than Mr. Snape. It would also seem rather incredible that you would try to tell me that instead of accepting assistance from other students, he chose to jinx them instead of his attackers."

"He is rather twisted," Sirius complained.

"Should be committed to St. Mungo's for our safety," James agreed.

"Gryffindor house is known for its bravery. Ambushing an unarmed opponent, and then having the nerve to lie. How many times have I had to listen to your cowardly falsehoods? Then turning on students put into authority – Miss Evans is a prefect, and Miss Oakby is Head Girl. It's their word against yours."

James countered, "What about Remus? He's a prefect too. He didn't even cast a spell this morning."

"A prefect?" McGonagall asked incredulously. "I think a _real _prefect would have stepped in and tried to break up the fight. Especially a Gryffindor prefect who should know right from wrong, like Miss Evans. Rather than sitting on the sideline as a _spineless_ spectator like Mr. Lupin who also did not even stand up for his fellow prefect."

"Oy! It wasn't like that at all," complained Sirius in defense of Remus.

Narrowing her eyes and turning on Remus, McGonagall growled, "Alright, Mr. Lupin, here is your one and only chance to tell me why you should still be allowed to be a prefect. Did you say or do anything in defense of Mr. Snape, Miss Evans or Miss Oakby?"

When Remus hesitated, James exclaimed, "It was happening too fast for him to do anything."

Peter nodded in agreement. He couldn't spin a tale as fast nor as good as James or Sirius.

They really were trying McGonagall's patience. "Too fast? Is that the only reason why a Slytherin third year was able to react faster when he saw a savage attack on someone's person and dignity, rather than one of the prefects I chose to represent Gryffindor?"

Sirius stood up in disgust at the thought that his disgusting slimeball of a brother, Regulus, could be looking like a hero next to Remus. "Listen here, I won't put up with you insulting ..."

"Sit down! I am not finished, Mr. Black," roared McGonagall with a fire in her eyes. "I'll tell you what I find insulting. The Headmaster has opened Hogwart's to more than just students with a witch and wizard as their parents. You four have taken it upon yourselves to contradict this policy openly."

"We did not!" James declared.

"Let me put it in simpler terms, Mr. Potter. You yourself said you attacked the half-blood student because he exists. Then you attacked a muggle born student, and then another student who was trying to help them. I think the term you use among yourselves would be 'blood traitor' for someone helping those of that are not purebloods like the four of you.

"I can only remove fifty points each because that's all Gryffindor has, while still allowing the twenty points I gave Miss Evans to remain. Never in all my time as head of house has Gryffindor fallen so low. I am also removing Mr. Lupin as prefect. I cannot leave him in a position of authority if there is the chance that he will abuse it, even if it is through inaction. We are going to see the Headmaster now for further actions that can be taken, including the possibility of expulsion."

"No way! Slytherins are always spouting that pureblood nonsense," Sirius complained.

"And I didn't mean it that way, Professor, when I told Evans that I was attacking Snape because he exists. I would have attacked him no matter who his parents are. We don't go around calling people those kind of names."

"Damn straight," Sirius agreed.

Since he became a prefect, Remus had a slight inkling that something like this could happen – getting the prefecture taken away due to his friends – however, the bigger threat of expulsion because he was a werewolf always seemed much more likely.

***************************

Prof. McGonagall arrived at the Headmaster's office with two angry students and two worried students.

There was no offer of candy or tea as the five new arrivals took their seats. Nor did Dumbledore share a smile or allow his eyes to twinkle.

Albus Dumbledore began his speech with a sigh, then said, "I am very disappointed in the four of you. Although it is with a slight degree of relief that we now know who has been assaulting the female students, the way you have openly flaunted your disregard for your fellow students is appalling."

He held up a hand when Sirius and James tried to interrupt. "I also find your thoughts to avoid punishment by waiting till the end of the school year to hold the gross spectacle out on the lawn today reprehensible. There will be consequences.

There will be no sixth year male Gryffindor prefect come September. None of you seem capable of handing any kind of responsibility. Additionally, none of you will be allowed the privilege of being a member of the house quidditch team for the remainder of your time as students."

That was too much for James, and he exclaimed, "No way!"

"Would you rather not be a student, Mr. Potter?"

"But Gryffindor's crap without James!" protested Sirius.

"You young men need to rethink your priorities," snapped Prof. McGonagall.

The headmaster continued, "You will also be on probation for the remainder of your time here. Put one toe out of line, and you will be facing expulsion."

"Aw come on, as soon as someone hears that, they'll do their best to make it look like we've done something," pleaded James.

"I suggest you all learn to be model students then," commented Prof. McGonagall. "You'll have the entire summer to practice, and perhaps write a few notes of apology."

"Excellent idea, Minerva."


	8. Chapter 8 Doing his Job

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AN: Hi! I end up doing shorter chapters when I'm changing up on which characters I want to focus on to move the story along. I have written a bit ahead because I like to reread and tweak my words after I've finished, and I also have an outline so I don't forget to put in little snippets that will come into play later. It's much easier to keep the Marauders as antagonists if they are still in school :^) It's also been my perception that it isn't so easy to get expelled from Hogwart's.

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 8 Doing his Job

Frank Longbottom was able to catch up to Prof. McGonagall after dinner. He had spent much of the afternoon considering the thoughts that weighed down his conscious.

He was still uncomfortable expressing them so started with his dissent over the decision to punish the four Gryffindors by just removing one from the quidditch team next year. Losing Lupin as a prefect was no punishment either since he was just a spy for the Marauders. He never disciplined or reported anyone.

It was to no avail though because McGonagall closed the topic of discussion with, "It is the Headmaster's decision to give the boys a second chance. They'll have the entire summer holiday to change their tune, and their parents are being made aware of it."

Frank had his doubts about their parents. He knew his own mother could sort them all out in a couple months, but they broke the mold when Augusta Longbottom was forged.

Broaching the subject hesitantly, Frank started with, "You know, I've caught these four out of bounds in the past, Professor."

"Of course, Mr. Longbottom."

"Well, it didn't take a Ravenclaw to realize that there was an easy enough way to catch them. I started keeping an eye on Mr. Snape in my spare time. Nothing weird, just keeping him in line of sight in the library and taking notice of him in the halls and such."

"You baited a trap for your housemates using a Slytherin as bait?"

"I don't think Snape knew. He certainly didn't seem thankful when I ended any altercation quickly. Anyway … Mr. Snape is a target for more than Gryffindors. It took a while for me to catch on that Slytherin house is not entirely composed of clutzes, y'know. It's always older students. They'll catch him in the head or shoulder with their bookbags when he's seated. They'll physically smash into him in the halls and on the stairs."

"If it's true then Mr. Snape should complain to his head of house, Frank. I'm not in the position to mete out punishments unless I see it happen or Mr. Snape is somehow incapacitated from making a complaint."

"Yeah, I know … what happens in Slytherin, stays in Slytherin. But Professor, there has to be something. Unless he's suddenly taken an interest in quidditch and is falling off his broom or getting flattened by bludgers, there's no other reasonable explanation that I can come up with for him being so banged up and bruised."

"You are telling me secondhand information, Mr. Longbottom. From your account, you were not present until after Mr. Snape had acquired a robe."

"I was with him after in the Slytherin dorms when he got dressed."

"What were you doing in the Slytherin dormitory, Mr. Longbottom?"

Displeased with Prof. McGonagall being intentionally obtuse, Frank explained, "I didn't feel it fair to send him in alone when I had suspicions. Additionally, I did not want any delays to be caused by his housemates." He then added with audible exasperation, "And I'm glad I did. Do you know they've carved 'Blood Traitor' on his trunk? How likely is it that he'll turn in a couple of those fellows when the rest of them think the same?"

Slowly Prof. McGonagall replied, "Well, I am glad at least that you are able to consider the possible repercussions. It's not like Mr. Snape can be plucked out of Slytherin and dropped into another house. Slytherin is his house and family. And it's a well-known saying that one can choose their friends, but they cannot choose their family."

"Well, that's just it, isn't it?" asked Frank. "I think Evans is Snape's only real friend, and the Slytherins don't like it. They are just a lot more demonstrative than the Gryffindors are towards Evans. The Gryffindors prefer to attack Snape, rather than one of their own. On the other hand, the Slytherins see no problem with attacking one of their own.

"The Gryffindors have been on my back about Alice because she's a Hufflepuff, but they don't do more than talk. And the Hufflepuffs don't bother Alice at all because they are happy because she is happy."

Prof. McGonagall smiled, "Well, we'll just have to hope that Miss Evans and Mr. Snape continue to overcome this adversity, Mr. Longbottom."


	9. Chapter 9 Hitting the Books

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 9 Hitting the Books

Severus chose a table close to Madam Pince's desk to revise for the Transfiguration OWL. Unfortunately, Avery and Wilkes joined him. He had been hoping Lily would head here after dinner.

The two of them did concentrate on their studying, but there was a silent undercurrent to their group. Severus was weighing the possibilities -

they really wanted to study

they were keeping an eye on him in order to make sure he didn't get away from some punishment

they were keeping an eye on him to make sure there was not another embarrassing incident

Knowing the rotten luck he possessed, Severus was sure that some sort of in-house repercussion awaited. It shouldn't be unbearable since Ravenclaw did not gain any points from the debacle, and Regulus Black had been awarded twenty points, along with Lily and Alice. Severus had not been awarded any points, but anytime he encountered the Marauders and didn't lose them was favorable. It didn't really matter that they lost 200 points for Gryffindor. There were no rewards for second place in the race for House Cup.

Severus decided to be contrary and stayed in the library studying until Madam Pince informed the room it was closing time. It made little difference to him whether Avery or Wilkes got a decent grade.

There were a few grunts that adolescent boys use to communicate amongst themselves to confirm they were all heading back to the Slytherin common room. It was unlikely that Severus would be able to lose them between now and curfew. They were too smart for the 'got to use the gents' excuse. He paced himself on the return to the dungeons. Warily, he kept even with them so they were not behind him. It seemed they too did not want to let Severus fall back to the rear.

Severus knew the time had come when he entered the common room, and a sixth year girl asked, "Alright, Severus?"

He stopped and stared at her trying to unravel the depths of her devious plan. He perceived a larger plot when a seventh year girl lifted her face out of her book to stop her NEWT revision long enough to ask, "Alright, Severus?"

This was bad. Better not to let them know that I know, thought Severus, and he returned a stiff nod. He began to move again taking the best strategic course between the common room entrance to the boys' dormitory. Close to the wall with furniture nearby to conveniently use as a shield, if needed, and that kept his back turned away from the main part of the room.

More Slytherin ladies asked, "Alright, Severus?" He grunted out "Fine," a few times, and finished with a "Fine. Thank you for asking," to the last interrogator before escaping the room.

Cautiously, Severus moved to his door while keeping an eye out for anyone following, or tell-tale shimmers of someone disillusioned laying in wait to strike. It was a huge disappointment when he found himself alone in the dorm. Severus didn't want to waste all night playing this stupid game. Now that he was alone, he cast a precautionary shield charm upon himself, in case the first few spells sent at him were particularly nasty.

He also remembered to throw Rosier's shoes back in his trunk, now that Longbottom got the chance to feel good about himself for donating a pair and a belt to miserable Severus Snape. If Longbottom didn't, then Severus was sure Alice Oakby would be sure to tell him in no uncertain terms and with lots of spit exchanged. That was the only reason that Severus even accepted Longbottom's castoffs because he felt there would be nothing owed since Longbottom was going to receive a reward from Oakby.

Severus waited close to twenty minutes in readiness for their next move.

Mulciber came in with his other four roommates and asked, "Yo Snape, were you in my trunk?"

"No." Which was absolutely true if one limited the time period to either today or just this week.

"Someone was in mine too," Rosier added dismissively. "All my wards were removed."

"Did that berk, Longbottom, go searching for contraband?" demanded Wilkes.

"No. He stayed right there the whole time," Severus replied while pointing next to his own trunk.

Avery muttered, "Some little sneak must have gotten into our room. I'll change the password again."

Severus saw when their eyes shifted to each other to coordinate whatever they had planned. He was sure he could at least get one or two to join him in the infirmary tonight, if it was to be a confrontation here with his rather dull fellow fifth years.

"So …" Wilkes said in a sly tone, "we hear you unleashed your ravenous beast out by the lake and challenged the giant squid to a duel, Snape."

The others snickered, and Severus suspected they had spent all day coming up with this bit of wit. Even more of a letdown was their crude reference. Being the son of Tobias Snape, Severus knew that any word could be twisted into something lewd. However, he would punctuate his speech with enough swear words to make sure no listener was left in the dark. Here Severus was at this bastion of enlightened learning, and these dunderheads were trying to be humorous about cocks, specifically his. It was sad to have his juvenile dream of Hogwart's further degraded, but it only proved to Severus once again that dreams and hopes were for children and fools.

*****************************************

Lily Evans avoided going back to the Gryffindor common room until curfew. When she arrived, she saw that she needn't have worried because those two conceited fatheads, Sirius Black and James Potter, were holding court. Of course, they wouldn't be bothered studying for their Transfiguration OWL. Their egos were so large that there was no need to burden themselves with real knowledge.

Heading straight for the stairwell to the girls' dorm, Lily overheard, " … banned from playing Quidditch. What are Gryffindors chances for the Cup next year then? You should get your parents to write Dumbledore, especially if they were Gryffindors themselves."

"No worries, Prongs, you know he'll lift the ban before the first game. He's got to. Dumbledore was just trying to get sourpuss McGonagall off his back."

"You're right, Padfoot, but for him even to threaten it … I think he deserves some payback."

Lily marched up the stairs in a fouler mood. Quidditch! Of course, that was the only thing that mattered. Those jerks probably planned to wait till year-end to reveal that they were the ones casting that jinx. Always enjoy taking credit for their dirty tricks. Couldn't let this remain a mystery. Pity was that only Potter was on the house quidditch team. Some freaking punishment.

Mary and Helen were already in the room when Lily arrived. Seemed strange since they were both sweet on Potter and Black, and should be downstairs hanging on their every word.

Helen said, "Lily, I heard. How terrible for them to do that. And to think they have been jinxing Gryffindor girls too to cover their tracks all this time. Don't worry though. Us girls are sticking together and avoiding all four of those losers. What creeps!"

"Thanks," replied Lily. At least she could count on the Gryffindor women to take a stand. "With all that was going on, I wasn't as humiliated as I could have been, and I was able to keep my school robe closed."

"That's certainly a relief," Mary said with a firm nod. "No one was looking at you after they hit Snape."

"Did they really …?" Helen's question petered out, but Mary understood.

"Oh yeah. Stark naked in his birthday suit," Mary replied. "I could see everything."

"If you were there to see _everything_," snipped Lily, "why didn't you help?"

"What? And get that jinx cast on me by those pervs? Oh no. I am more than willing to learn from your mistakes, Lily."

"Well?" Helen asked encouragingly.

Mary giggled and commented, "He's a dark, brooding … hippogriff."

Helen smirked and then teased, "Is that what you see in him, Lily? You know I've noticed he can get very intense. That's got to be way better than boys that can't pay the simplest attention to a girl if quidditch, food or a shiny object comes along."

"Stop talking about Severus like that!" Lily pleaded. "He's only my potions lab partner."

"Yeah, for like five years … all of the rest of us switch around, but you two are always partners, even when you say you are mad at him."

"Why are you two being so thick? There's an odd number of Gryffindors and Slytherins in our potion class, that means whenever we have a lab that there's going to be one Gryffindor stuck with a Slytherin, unless someone is out sick."

Mary and Helen laughed, then Helen said, "Oh, now I see. You are sacrificing yourself for our safety. Well, if I get into NEWT level, maybe I'll bravely volunteer to suffer with your Sevvie. At the very least, he is brilliant at Potions."

"Sevvie," Mary repeated with a titter.

"Oooooh, you two," Lily growled. "Just stop talking about him like that."

"Jealous? We are just trying to be supportive, Lily. It's not like we can talk about your boyfriend's other charms without being insulting. I mean, he's … not much to look at."

"He is not my boyfriend."

"So you won't mind if I send him a couple letters over the holiday then?" Helen asked.

Lily's face screwed up as she asked, "What would you even write to him about? You don't even know him."

"We could write to him about our holiday potions assignment," suggested Mary.

"Sev knows I'm good at potions too. He'll think you are trying to be silly, and he doesn't like people making fun of him," huffed Lily.

"We may be Gryffindors, but I think we can understand how to be subtle. Since you said you two live so close to each other, why don't you have the two of us over early in the holiday, and then we can kind of meet up with him when we go for a walk near his house? Then we can at least have the excuse to write thank you notes. Those Slytherins are really big on etiquette and writing little notes."

"Arrrgggh, just stop it. There is no way I'm showing you where he lives. You can't go there."

"Unplottable?"

"So dangerously warded that birds flying over are shot out of the sky?"

"No!"

"Alright then. We'll go along with your plan to keep your beau a man of mystery."

"Good. Because I want to finish studying and get some sleep without any more of your crazy talk about Severus Snape."

Lily was noisy as she got ready for bed, and lay down upon it with her books to do a little more cramming. Mary and Helen may be the teasing sort, but for a moment there, it sounded like they were really serious about bothering Sev over the holidays. What was the world coming to?


	10. Chapter 10 Catching the train out

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 10 Catching the train out of crazy town

AN: I miss Regulus so I gave him a moment to continue his crusade against Sirius.

Severus Snape was torn by the feeling that maybe it was good to be leaving Hogwart's and going home. His OWL testing was completed, he ducked out of the house-wide celebration last night when the Slytherins won the House Cup as expected at the Leaving Feast and had gotten a good night's sleep, and was now confirming that all his items were in his trunk before he locked, warded and erased all the nasty words from it. Feeling uneasy about leaving it unguarded, Severus shrunk it down and pocketed it. Since his mother was a witch, he could sneak in a little magic around his house to resize it.

He felt himself becoming maudlin over his reflection that school had indeed come to resemble home. He had two more years of both of these locations before he could find a new place for his life. Would that too become as inhospitable and deal him more misery? Some days Severus wondered if all he was born to enjoy was suffering.

*******************************

Regulus was well-pleased. Once Snape was gone from the Slytherin house party last night, Regulus let it slip that his brother's cruel and unusual treatment of the fifth year was due to Snape spurning Sirius. Simply put, Sirius fancied Snape and couldn't live with Snape's cruel rejection when Sirius made his declaration of admiration. The story reached enough pureblood ears that within a week, his mother would be receiving some disturbing mail regarding her eldest son.

*******************************

Severus was positive that at no time did he encourage, aid, smile, wink, smirk or even leer at Frank Longbottom or Alice Oakby. However, here he was waylaid and now stowed away in their compartment of the Hogwarts Express with a couple of other recent Hufflepuff graduates. The only reason for his presence in this car was that they desired to torment him in their strange Hufflepuff manner. Even though Longbottom was a Gryffindor, he was of no help because he just sat there like a lump smiling. He even smiled at Severus. Half-wit!

This bunch of nosy parkers wouldn't accept his glares and grunts as answers and were frankly pests to find out the answers to their questions. Luckily, they did so much talking that Severus was able to keep his answers short in order to allow them to go back to their favorite subject, themselves.

Just as he thought the torture was about to end, Alice asked as she looked out the train window, "Where are your parents, Severus?"

Swallowing his annoyance at being addressed without permission by his given name, Severus replied, "They trust me to catch a train home on my own."

"By yourself?" she asked like he was just finishing his first year at Hogwart's, which was the first time he had done it on his own, by the way.

Horror-struck that they could try to hold his hand all the way to Derbyshire, Snape just blurted out the truth, "Evans and her family take the same train. I'll have company."

"Oh! That's wonderful. Your parents know each other?"

"Sort of," Severus replied while trying to make an escape.

He twitched when Frank put his arm around him. "We'll see you over to them, Severus, since you already have your luggage."

"Could you unhand me, Longbottom?"

Frank did as Severus asked, and took hold of Alice's hand. They kept close. Finally Severus pointed out a prim, tight-lipped young lady standing against the wall. "That's Evans' older sister."

After being trapped with the Hufflepuffs, Petunia was a step up for Severus. She didn't care what he thought about the weather, if he were hot, cold or hungry, and preferred for him to remain silent and as far away from her as possible. He knew that Petunia's parents treated her to a shopping excursion in London every time she came to the train station to meet Lily, but without her mother there, he may not get any acknowledgement out of her that they even knew each other. It was a pretty sad state of things when Severus Snape wanted Petunia Evans to say hello to him.

Severus added, "She's not a witch, and gets kind of uncomfortable around us … so if you don't mind, I think this is farewell."

"Sure, why don't you write us over the summer, Severus?"

Severus grunted and went over to Petunia Evans. Since Frank and Alice were still watching him, he muttered, "Petunia."

"Snape," she replied coldly. Petunia angled her head so she appeared to be looking down her nose at the wretch, and could keep that look on him all day if necessary.

She was still in that position nearly a whole minute later when someone barked, "Oy, giraffe neck!"

Now that he had the attention of both Severus and Petunia, Sirius laughed and continued on his way past with, "Your sister's almost as ugly as you, Snivellus."

Both Severus and Petunia were obviously indignant at such an insulting mistake. Severus had taken out his wand, but Sirius had pushed through the crowd with little care who he jostled. Petunia was smart enough not to go chasing after the mongrel through the crowded platform that was packed full of freaks.

With a sudden thought, Severus turned to Petunia, still holding his ebony wand in plain sight. "Don't you dare," she snapped.

"No," he replied testily. "Did you get hit with a spell?" Severus asked while trying to not look directly at Petunia's bust. "That boy and his friends have been jinxing girls all over the school for months."

"How would I know? And how do I know you're not playing some kind of sick prank and did something to me yourself?"

Severus made a face and then put away his wand.

"That freak didn't do something to my neck, did he?" Petunia asked while feeling with her hands.

"No. It's fine. Maybe he was just jealous 'cause it looks like his mum has no neck at all, unless it's hidden under one of those quadruple chins she has," Severus replied with a jerk of his head towards the distant end of the platform. With a quick glance at Petunia before returning his gaze to the train to search for Lily, Severus added, "I think a better word for your neck would be statuesque. Like those old marbles they got in museums of Aphrodite." He didn't explain that he felt her neck was similar to Lily's, and therefore above reproach.

"You can just say you don't have fare for the train, Snape. You know my mother will get you home."

"I have it, Petunia. Unless the fare's gone up a whole lot from last time."

Petunia Evans didn't know why Severus Snape would actually say something nice about her, and where she was the only one around the hear it, but she was going to keep an eye on him. Obviously he was up to something.

*******************************

"OK, Wormtail, it's all up to you," encouraged James Potter, after Sirius distracted Snivellus. "I'll tell your folks that you're coming while you follow Snape and find out where he's going."

"Of course, James. I'll follow him and get that station name," Peter replied with an ingratiating smile, and then disappeared as he turned into a rat.


	11. Chapter 11 Avocado Appliances

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 11 Avocado Appliances

Not even one day had passed before Severus was sitting on the stairs of the Evans' back porch waiting for Lily. It was still early, but after Mr. Evans had taken the car to work.

At home, Severus did not dress as nicely as he did at school. One could probably find better shoes discarded on the side of the highway or hanging as a pair from a telephone line. The brown leather was cracked, and there was a gap between the upper section's toe and the sole of the left shoe. The shoelaces were a series of knots to hold them together. His trousers were a stained, medium grey corduroy with the cords worn away from the seat and knees. They were sized for a heavier man, but there was an old pair of braces holding them up. The braces themselves had a couple knots likewise to size them for Severus. Underneath the worn cotton jumper that was once black, but now a faded grey, he wore a plain cotton undershirt, that was also a shade of grey, instead of its original white, and riddled with holes. Both the undershirt and jumper were too large for him also. The jumper was also horribly stretched out of shape, with the neck opening being an ill-fitting mess, and the sleeve ends were folded over in cuffs to expose his hands.

Severus was resting his elbows on his knees and allowing his hair to hang forward, curtaining his face. It did not matter to him how long he waited since he had nothing better to do with his time.

After the shadows started to move across the back lawn, the door opened behind him, and Mrs. Evans asked, "Care for a cuppa, Severus?"

Looking up, Severus saw that Mrs. Evans was already extending a large mug of tea to him. He stood, took it and said, "Thank you, Mrs. Evans."

She held the door open and motioned for Severus to come into the kitchen. It was the antithesis of his family's kitchen at Spinner's End. This kitchen was full of color – white, sunny yellow and avocado – and was clean, modern, shining and sparkling. His kitchen also had windows, but the sun actually penetrated these to light the room. The Evans kitchen was larger and had a nice counter with two comfy stools, in addition to the table with four chairs for the family members. Severus took a seat at the counter to stay out of Mrs. Evans' way because she had already gone back to the stove after picking up some ingredients from the refrigerator.

Knowing Severus for some years now, Mrs. Evans didn't bother making small talk for his sake. He was a fascinating conversationalist when motivated, but the only thing that got him talking was her daughter, Lily. Petunia could also provoke him into speech, but the two preferred to argue rather than discuss things like two civilized people.

Filling a breakfast bowl, Mrs. Evans placed the bowl of porridge in front of Severus and commented, "The girls are up, and should be down soon, dear."

"Thank you, Mrs. Evans," he said again, and looked her straight in the face as he accepted the spoon from her hand.

Mrs. Evans gave him a quick visual inspection before turning away. At the moment, he looked uninjured. Were his parents actually glad to see him home after so long? The unnaturalness of that family had made her uneasy for years. Of course, she had called that child abuse number anonymously a number of times now, but nothing ever seemed to happen. Talking directly to Severus did no good because he went into a state of denial when he did have a black eye or evidence of being mistreated. In fact she felt she had made it worse because to stop all the bother and avoid trouble, Severus would stop coming round when he was injured so in an odd way, Mrs. Evans was happy to find him on the porch any morning.

Of course it was a blessing that Severus had manners, even if he was not much in the way of company. And if Mrs. Evans asked him to do any kind of work, he'd do it without complaint. He also helped Lily complete her chores, in order for her to be able to leave the house that much sooner. She wished some of Petunia's boys would take a page from Severus' book in that regard, instead of acting like they should be waited on hand and foot.

Petunia came into the kitchen first and immediately made a sour face to indicate what she thought about Severus Snape bringing his filthy self into her home. Since her mother was in the room, she restricted herself to giving him the stink eye whenever Mrs. Evans was not looking in her direction. To annoy her, Severus smirked, and was even bold enough to say, "Good morning."

Shortly after that, Lily entered the kitchen with a bright, "Good morning, everyone."

Although he knew it was silly to think so, Severus felt that the sunlight streaming into the kitchen became brighter in response to Lily's presence. The air became effervescent, and any bodily aches he thought he suffered from, disappeared.

"You know, Lily, it's a good thing I had some of those coins left in the jar from last summer. That owl was already here this morning with your newspaper," Mrs. Evans commented as she brought Lily her own bowl of porridge and her paper.

"Oh, good. I have more coins upstairs, mum."

Since Petunia had been given another stern talking to by her parents, she restrained herself to just a sniff of disdain. She wouldn't have to put up with this much longer. Petunia was 19, had a part-time job, was a good cook, and was doing just fine with meeting gentlemen with good prospects. It was regrettable because Petunia did love her parents deeply, and if tortured, would admit she loved Lily too, but this introduction of magic into their lives was abominable. Rather than treating it properly like they would a mental disorder, and get Lily help, they embraced it and tried to make it part of all their lives.

Severus kept an eye on Lily to make sure he ate just fast enough to finish when she did. He made a sort of game out of how long he could make a bowl of porridge last because if he finished too quickly, Mrs. Evans tried to force more food on him.

Rather than being impolite and holding the paper in front of her face, Lily folded it over twice and glanced at it while eating.

After the second flip and refold, she announced, "They are going to let Aurors cast Unforgivables."

"All three?" asked Severus.

"Yes."

"They don't need to cast any of them. It's a huge mistake for the Ministry to allow it."

"They need to protect themselves, Severus."

"Unforgivables are not protection."

"That's a rich one, coming from you."

"What?" demanded Severus hotly.

"I know the types of books you read."

"Those are about things that everyone would rather leave forgotten until someone uses them. Whoever is casting it is doubtfully not going to be polite enough to reverse a Dark Arts spell if you add 'pretty please' to your request. A little education wouldn't hurt in case you need to protect yourself, even if it's from your own ignorance." Severus waved his hand in agitation, and continued, "You know how easy it would be to get a wizard to stick something metal in an electric socket? Because they don't know any better?"

Although she obviously wasn't listening to their nonsense, Petunia did laugh out loud.

Lily glared at Petunia because she didn't want Severus to think he was right. He had it all wrong.

Pressing his current control of the conversation, Severus turned it back toward the original topic. "What good reason could an auror have for casting _Cruciatus_ on someone?"

While Lily thought, Mrs. Evans asked, "Which one is that?"

"Unbearable pain, and if it is held on a victim long enough they could be driven insane. Kind of interesting that the word to cast it resembles the word crucify so much, isn't it, Mrs. Evans?"

"Well … they shouldn't be casting that one, Severus," Lily answered.

"Exactly. Even if the victim had a trial and was found guilty, there's no reasonable explanation to condone that sort of torture."

"But the other two would be alright," Lily countered.

"Why would _Imperius_ be alright?" asked Severus. He then added for Mrs. Evans benefit, "The victim is under the control of the caster and has no will of their own."

"It could be used to help catch other criminals."

"Who would it be cast on? Someone who they think is guilty, but who hasn't been tried? Or maybe the relatives of a suspected criminal?"

"Hmmmm … maybe if they had some sort of way of getting approval, like they do with a warrant to search or wiretap."

"I think the urge to cast _Imperius_ would be stronger than that. They could even use it to suggest crimes to their potential lawbreaker."

"What do you mean?"

Severus gave it a moment of thought before suggesting, "Let's say Longbottom goes on to be an auror. He remembers that he confiscated a questionable book from me back at school. That leads him to believe that it's possible I could commit crimes. So he gets permission to cast an _Imperius_ on you to find out if I'm doing things. He instructs you to meet up with me and suggest that we … oh let's see … burn down Potter's house. I tell you that's a jolly good idea and we'd have an absolutely spiffing time and off we go and burn it down, including his beloved stuffed mooncalf that he had since childhood from his dear beloved great-aunt Noddy.

"You would be innocent because you were under the _Imperius_, of course. I'd be in big trouble alone. And to tell the truth, I probably wouldn't have thought to burn down that dunderhead's house in the first place if you hadn't suggested it, and given me his address."

"They wouldn't use it like that," asserted Lily.

"Wouldn't they?"

Mrs. Evans took care of offering tea quietly, even to Petunia who had not left.

"No, they wouldn't, Severus. Stop thinking the worst of everyone. And anyway, I think the only one that they'd really use is the Killing Curse."

"There's still too much chance of a mistake with that. How many spells get cast in the hallways in school and miss the intended target? Can't say 'whoops' and get it sorted after you've killed someone."

"They wouldn't be aiming that around while there's innocent people in the way."

"How do they know who's innocent? That's a very quick spell to cast so not much consideration is needed."

"Ah ha, but you have to mean it when you cast any of these spells."

"You are putting a little too much emphasis on that minor point, Lily. It's just a whim that you want someone dead, not a soul-wrenching angst that will prevent it from being cast if it's really a person who doesn't deserve to die when it's aimed at them."

Lily studied Severus closely. Had he ever cast it? Would he even answer her if she asked? Or did he know someone that cast it? Everyone at school knew what those Slytherins were up to, and who they supported.

Severus didn't like the considering look in Lily's eye, so pushed on with, "I concede that in a pitched fight between wanted criminals and law enforcement, it would be useful to have a method to eliminate their opponents, rather than incapacitating them in a manner that may be reversed by their cronies. It wouldn't do to tie up or stun someone, and then have them pop back up, rejoin the fight, and start trying to kill the good guys again."

"At least you can see some sense in it, I suppose."

"At least in the real world," Severus used that term for the benefit of Petunia and her mother, "they are civilized enough to not allow police to normally carry guns so less accidents happen.

"In the wizarding world, the law is a little backwards with regards to the Killing Curse as opposed to other murders, don't you think?"

His question had exactly the effect he wanted, when Lily practically exploded, "What?!?"

"If someone uses the Killing Curse and it results in the quick and painless death of someone, even in a moment of anger that they regret, they go to prison for life. However, if someone plans and carries out a long, suffering death of another, they are not guaranteed a life sentence. Some can get off in a few years if they have enough money and a plausible defense."

Lily took a deep breath, scrunched up her face and admitted, "I guess that's true, but if I had a say in someone torturing another to death, I'd make sure they never got out."

"I wouldn't expect less from you," Severus pleasantly replied.

"All this talk of death and killing," interrupted Mrs. Evans, "you make it sound so violent."

Lily shook her head and muttered, "So many jerks at school, casting mean things at people left and right, it's a bit terrifying to think that one day they could be either police or members of the government."

"Dear, this probably isn't the right time to bring it up, but your father and I do want to discuss a letter we got from school … about you know, and I just want you to know that we'll understand."

"You don't have to say 'you know', mum. Severus was there. He reversed the spell on me, once he was able to. He got attacked too."

"Oh my … Severus, are your parents …?"

"What? I've never seen any definitive evidence that they can read so if they were sent a letter, they probably used it for TP," Severus replied in order to prevent any further discussion regarding his home.

"Aw, come on, your mum sends you howlers, Sev," Lily playfully reminded him.

"They aren't from my 'mum', Lily. She can't put words together for a whole sentence, how's she going to dictate a whole letter, when she can't say my first name in less than thirty seconds? I think Black sends them. He's such a sterling wit … besides being Tunie's new friend," Severus alluded to them being more than just friends with a sly wink in Petunia's direction.

"I don't know any of your freak chums," Petunia said with a scowl.

Since Petunia was so obliging to turn the conversation firmly away from his parents and Black's hilarious howlers that promised bare-bottomed spankings and blatant hints that his mother still bathed him because he didn't know how, Severus decided to be kind. "That barmy bloke at the station yesterday."

"Uh! That lairy sod that thought I was _your sister_, Snape?"

"Well, we already knew he was blind when he initially insulted you."

"Of course," Petunia agreed while absently rubbing her neck.

Concerned that Black thought Petunia was Severus' sister and jinxed her, Lily asked, "He didn't … uh … ?"

"No way," Severus emphatically commented. "Tunie stared him down, and he went running over to his mother."

From Lily's current blush, and Severus' initial reaction yesterday, Petunia could only suspect what exactly her mother referred to by 'you know' in Lily's letter from school. Nasty freaks!


	12. Chapter 12 Cavemen

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 12 Cavemen

After a couple weeks, Petunia had had enough. Insulting Severus directly, whenever her parents weren't within earshot was having absolutely no effect. He didn't even have the decency to look embarrassed. It was just intolerable that the neighbors kept seeing him lurking about the Evans' house because he kept showing up in broad daylight. He had no sort of consideration for people's reputations.

Petunia planned it all perfectly. Severus left their house before dinner time every day to go home, and on Petunia's night off of work, she'd go into Lily's bedroom, and have one of those girlfriend heart-to-heart talks to make her see sense that this Snape boy had to go, and it was kinder to just cut him off completely before things got any more out of hand.

Lily's bedroom door was ajar, and Petunia politely knocked on it before entering with a friendly smile on her face, in spite of there being a smelly owl cage in the corner of the room. Fortunately, the repulsive flying beast was not in the room.

"Petunia?" Lily greeted questioningly.

"Lily, you have to try this great new shampoo. It smells so good."

"Really?" Lily asked as she reached for the bottle that Petunia was offering.

"I've gotten compliments on it," Petunia mentioned lightly, before taking hold of Lily's hand. "What have you done now? I hope it's not more frogspawn."

Lily studied her other hand, but saw nothing wrong with it. "No, no frogspawn yet. We haven't seen any in the river yet at all this summer. Do you think maybe there could be a higher pollution level from some factory around here?"

It was a little too early in the talk to bring up Severus' house so close to the river meaning he was the 'wrong sort', and that Lily should not be walking along that filthy river with him anyway.

"Maybe if we scrub them up good, put some lemon juice on these freckles, give you a bit of a manicure, and then put a coat of polish on," Petunia suggested.

"Alright," Lily responded slowly, wondering why Petunia was suddenly so nice. Was she having someone special round for dinner, and was trying to make Lily look presentable?

"Great. I'll go get everything. Do you want the same color for your toes too?"

"Um ..."

"I'll bring the whole lot so you can choose."

Lily was struck speechless as Petunia left the room to go get the beauty products. She turned around to her desk and placed the shampoo bottle down. Any more shocks, and Lily was afraid she'd drop it and shampoo would go squirting everywhere.

She had been in the middle of writing a reply to Mary MacDonald's letter when Petunia had come in, so took the time to cap her ink bottle and straighten everything up before Petunia returned.

Worrying, Lily took off her sandals and looked at her feet. She hadn't washed up after walking around with Severus today and they were rather filthy-looking. Afraid that Petunia would see them, she raced into the bathroom to give them a wash.

Lily beat Petunia back. It was small wonder because Petunia had a lot of stuff with her. It was a bit intimidating.

This might be good, Lily thought, because both Helen and Mary took Muggle Studies, and Lily didn't know much more than the basics about keeping clean and well-groomed. If either of them were continuing to NEWT level, this could be a lot of fun to share with them. In addition to spending some quality time with Petunia. Lily had been missing the closeness she used to share with Petunia.

Petunia started Lily with one of her hands soaking in a small bowl of slightly foamy green liquid. She left and came back again with a basin of water, squirted something minty in it, and then stuck it in front of Lily's chair for her to soak her feet. Petunia didn't say anything, but Lily did see the look of disgust that Petunia gave them when she grabbed Lily's ankle to guide them in.

Lily kept from giggling as she watched Petunia arrange everything just so, like it was some sort of ritual. Petunia also showed this sort of level of perfection when she invited others over for tea. Lily wasn't invited to Petunia's teas, but the hours of preparation in the kitchen were absolutely necessary to ensure its success. Sev and Lily benefited because they could eat anything that was not considered perfect since it was considered trash. It was thanks to Petunia that Lily now knew some foods that Severus really enjoyed. Severus' oddities and secrets presented a challenge, but Lily was working on it.

Finally, the implements were laid out precisely, with some towels folded, and some spread out, and a second chair brought close for Petunia to sit on. She leaned over, and positioned everything once more for Lily's other hand to now soak. Work was now ready to begin on Hand #1, and Petunia cradled it in a towel and inspected it, before choosing her first tool.

Lily broke the ice with what she hoped was an appropriate subject for this occasion. "Are you seeing anyone special?"

"I have a couple fellows that show promise. No one steady yet. I don't want anyone too old, but he's got to have a good, steady job first before I'll agree to see anyone exclusively." Petunia looked up from Lily's hand, and asked, "You know what I mean?"

"Yes," Lily agreed, and she really understood. She was having a serious conversation with her sister.

"The … blokes at your school, anyone even worth mentioning?"

Lily doubted Petunia wanted to hear about Severus, so spoke in general, "I think it's true what they say about girls maturing faster, Tunie. It could be because I have the same four juvenile boys from my house in every class and at every meal … but they are just plain horrible. They still don't even use napkins when they eat, and wipe their mouths on their sleeves and their sticky fingers on their pants."

"At sixteen, they still do that?"

"Yes. Well, that's the boys from my house at school. I think the Ravenclaws take a little more care when they eat because they always have books with them. Some of the older boys are alright. This year's Head Boy was from my house, and he always had good manners, and I never saw him play any stupid pranks on people."

"It can't be that bad, Lily."

"Oh no, it is. They act like the toilet's some kind of fun house. They put spells on everything in there. It was so bad that one of the first year students started wetting his bed. I mean … I only knew because I'm a prefect. It wasn't common knowledge."

"What about a boy from that Raven group then?"

"They are afraid of the louts from my house. They get crazy when there's some sort of interhouse thing going on. They are so competitive. You know in my year, there's four boys and three girls in my house. So they think they own us, and the odd man out is allowed to go out of house."

"Does that mean you are in the caveman group?"

"Exactly!" Lily agreed with a laugh. "It's terrible how they lump the like personalities together. It just brings out the worst in the ones that might have been good." As she said this, Lily started out meaning Remus Lupin, but as she finished speaking, realized it could also apply to Severus.

"You need to get one with any sort of potential on his own then to see if he can act civilized. Sometimes you need to get them away from their mates to end the herd mentality," Petunia recommended, as she painted a conditioning undercoat onto the nails of Hand #1.

"Sev's house is worse because it has five boys to two girls in our year, but at least they aren't cavemen. They are smart enough to talk to other houses, rather than fighting over two girls. And if you met them, you'd see they weren't worth fighting over, Tunie. They are so conceited and snotty. Remember Camilla from grade school? Like her, but with ten times the attitude."

"I can't see Snape in the same category with someone like that. If your house is cavemen, Raven is bookworms, what's his?"

"Depends on who you ask. It's supposed to be cunning, which I interpret as thinking before you act and playing to your strengths, but the boys in my house think they are sneaky and underhanded. I agree sometimes they do some rather rotten things."

Petunia nodded. "So which group does that boy who insulted me at the train station belong to?"

"Cavemen."

"And they've been doing stuff to girls at your school? Not sneaky Snape's mates?"

"Yeah. I don't like any of the boys from that house though, but Sev. His house mates … they are very judgemental about families and bloodlines and pureblood wizards."

"Who's Snape to talk about families?" Petunia snarled.

"He doesn't. He's just in the same house with them."

"So you've kept it – his family – a secret from them, Lily?

"No. There's only a handful of these pureblood British families and they all know each other. They know he's not one of them."

Petunia held up a selection of nail polish so Lily could choose a color.

"You know, Lily. Snape's not one of us either."

"I know you don't like Sev, Tunie, but he's my friend. And … he's not horrible to you. I've seen horrible at my school and … it's just hard to tell you some of the stuff they do there without it sounding like I'm … tortured."

Petunia pouted, "I know it's been years since he dropped a tree branch on my head, but around here, Lily, people know who he is. They've met his father – not socially, of course. People are judged by the company they keep."

Lily was having a marvelous time with Petunia. She knew what her sister was getting at, and in the spirit of sisterly bonding, she didn't verbally object to the idea and cause an argument. She'd talk to Sev, and they would think of something.


	13. Chapter 13 Gin in a Teacup

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 13 Gin in a Teacup

The next morning was bright and sunny. Truly a lovely day as Lily wolfed down her breakfast, and then pulled Severus out the back door.

"River?" he suggested.

"I want to keep my feet clean at least one day after all of Tunie's hard work," Lily replied, and then tilted her right foot back on its heel and waved her toes about to show off her pedicure.

Severus obligingly gazed down at Lily's foot. She was wearing different sandals than yesterday. "Very nice," he commented, thinking Petunia had something to do with Lily's sandals. If Lily liked them, he liked them.

"How about we go sit under the tree up on the hill?" Lily recommended as an alternative to walking along the river.

Severus shrugged. It hadn't rained lately so the ground would be dry.

"I've been meaning to ask … or maybe tell you, Sev. Uh, Mary and Helen said they were going to play a joke on me and write letters to you this summer. You haven't gotten any from them, have you?"

"No, haven't gotten any. How is it a joke on you if they write to me?"

"My point exactly, Sev. I told them it wouldn't be funny."

"Hmmm"

"Have you gotten letters from anyone yet? I mean, I don't mean to pry, but I've already gotten a few and school's been out less than a month. They must be really bored waiting for their OWL results."

"No."

"Uh … none?"

"No."

"Well, aren't you expecting some?"

"No." Severus stopped and turned to Lily. "I may get a letter once the test results are out. They'll find out what summer assignments they have, and when they finally get to working on them, they'll need help. So maybe late August," he smirked at his calculation. "If I get a letter, I'll show it to you. I know it's pretty boring till we know our schoolwork, but is it so bad that you are dying to know what Evan Rosier is doing over the holiday?"

Lily laughed, "When you put it that way, Sev, I guess I do sound rather desperate."

They walked on in silence as Lily eliminated the possibility that Severus could spend some time at a friend's house. Or at _another_ friend's house.

They sat down side by side with their backs to the trunk of a large shady elm on a modest hill that afforded a view of a few backyards including laundry hung out to dry.

Severus began, "In January, we'll be seventeen. Next summer we can apparate places."

"What if we don't pass the test?"

"Apparition's just power and focus. If you don't pass, you can sidealong with me."

"Oh no! You should be saying if you don't pass, I'll sidealong your skinny bum. And then I choose where we're going."

Severus looked at Lily expectantly and asked, "Where are we going?"

"We're going for a seaside holiday, Sev." When Lily saw his lack of enthusiasm, she explained, "You just don't know how much you'll like it yet 'cause you've never been."

Lily leaned back. "You just need some practice," she suggested as she reached over and tugged on his elbow. "Lay down."

Severus acquiesced and lay on his back. "Bit too shady?" he questioned, looking up at the leaves overhead.

"Got to take it in small steps. If we were really at the shore, we'd have brought some sunblock."

"But of course."

After five minutes of laying in silence, Severus turned his head to look at Lily. "I might not be able to show you all my letters. I can read parts to you of the ones you can't see."

"Secret Slytherin stuff you need to hide?" Lily asked teasingly, but in her heart she feared that it could be the rumored connection between Slytherin house and He Who Must Not Be Named … the future death eaters club.

Severus snorted, "Right." He rolled onto his side and put an arm under his head. "My housemates can be kind of disgusting. They might write to brag about some of their exploits."

Lily turned on her side to face Severus. "Hurting people?"

"No … girls," he clarified with a note of irritation. "I guess they could hurt them perhaps, but I don't think that'd be worth boasting about. Is that what the Gryffindor blokes like to do?"

"Uh … I don't know what they do, but it's a relief I suppose that you don't hear that kind of stuff from them."

Severus' free hand joined with Lily's between them. For a long time, they lay on their sides staring into each other's eyes. The breeze picked up and rustled the leaves overhead, creating brief patches of sun on their faces.

Lily sensed Severus had something to say. His breathing was still deep and slow, but he had started blinking more rapidly in advance of slightly creasing his forehead in thought.

His forehead smoothed, and then he softly said, "I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"For … for Hogwart's. I made it sound better to you than it really is."

"Hogwart's is brilliant, Sev."

"Yes … and no. There is brilliant parts, but then there's bad parts too."

"I love it there. I wouldn't want to go to school anywhere else."

Severus nodded his head slowly, and then said, "Well, it's only two more years."

Lily waited for Severus to elaborate with some sort of explanation, but he lapsed back to silently staring into her eyes. She wondered if his eyes were a different color other than the impenetrable black if there would be an answer there.

It became more windy as they lay together beneath the tree. When a gust blew Severus' hair over his face, Lily unclasped her hand from his, and pushed it out of his eyes.

While Lily's hand was still over his face, Severus spoke again. "Next year, when we go for our apparition tests, Lily, can we schedule them on the same day at the Ministry and then get married?"

"Uh … what … where .. I mean this is so sudden, Sev. We haven't even … uh... gone to Hogsmeade together yet." Lily's face got red at the graceless response to what definitely seemed like a real proposal of marriage. Where did that come from? And why would he even ask when they hadn't ever even kissed or gone on a date? They'd have another year of school after that, no place to live, no money, no jobs … it was insanity!

Severus' brow creased again as he processed Lily's reply. "Right. Hogsmeade. I suppose I should get permission to go there then."

"You haven't?" Lily asked, racking her brain to try to figure out if Severus was being sarcastic about her rejection.

"I didn't bother because I have no pocket money. That's all they do in Hogsmeade, isn't it? Honeydukes, Zonko's, and a butterbeer at the Three Broomsticks?"

Somehow when Severus described a day in Hogsmeade, it sounded shallow and smacked of hollow pleasures. If Lily realized this earlier, she … she would what? Severus wasn't likely to want her to buy him a butterbeer. "Yup, that's pretty much it. But if you were with me, then we'd be on a date."

"Alright then."

At that point, the rain began. It started small, with the sound of drops hitting the leaves overhead. They both sat up and looked overhead, and then there was a sudden deluge that clustered on the leaves so larger drops fell onto them in their leafy shelter. If the day had been hotter, it would have been refreshing. However, it wasn't that hot and the rain chilled Lily who was in a halter top, short and sandals.

Lily stood, and was puzzled when Severus did not do likewise. He was pulling his jumper over his head, and then thrusted it towards Lily. Severus' undershirt looked like it had been rescued from the bin, used as a rag, then thrown in the bin again before he put it on.

"What are you doing?" Lily asked.

"You need it."

"No, put it back on."

"You need it more than me."

"Where are you going to hide your wand?" Lily asked since Severus was now holding it, rather than hiding it in his shirt.

"Why are you being so difficult?" Severus asked while swinging his wet hair in front of his face.

"Why are you?" Lily snapped back at him.

"Because I wore something under my shirt today, and the flowers printed on my underpants are not visible through my wet shorts."

Lily grabbed the jumper and hissed, "You could have cast a drying charm on me."

"What good would that have done? It's coming down in buckets. Besides, I try to restrict my magic to the immediate vicinity of my house so I don't get caught."

"That's just _so_ convenient, isn't it?" she snarled in reply. Severus being right did not cool Lily's temper. Yes, her temper, that's why her face felt so hot and her cheeks were red, and for no other reason then Severus could be such a git. He's just lucky that his borrowed jumper was stretched out enough to reach to mid-thigh. Damn lucky, Lily thought, as she stomped off.

Following Lily, Severus realized that they were going in the wrong direction to return to Lily's house. He caught up to her as she pondered how best to ford across a swift-moving stream that had sprung into being because the street's drains were clogged with garbage.

"Where are you going?"

"You owe me a drying charm, Sev."

"It's still raining," he answered in confusion because he didn't understand why he would dry Lily outside Spinner's End, and then walk back to her house and get wet again.

Lily didn't know why Severus had to state the obvious. He looked wretched with his wet hair and his undershirt soaked against his body. Since the dark circles of his nipples were clearly visible through his thin shirt, Lily could only imagine what she looked like without his jumper.

"The house on the end?" Lily asked when they reached his street.

Severus nodded.

"Front or back door?"

"For what?"

"It's my turn to visit your home," Lily replied like it was perfectly natural, even though she'd never been in his house in all these years. If Petunia didn't want Severus over their place, Lily would come over here for a bit. She wasn't afraid of his parents.

Lily reached the front door of the narrow, one room wide house typical in this area and realized Severus was still in the street, a couple houses back. His arms were wrapped across his chest, and he was staring at Lily through the rain.

As far as Lily knew, Severus' mother was always home. The only time Lily remembered seeing her was at King's Cross for their first year departure to start school. She knocked on the door and waited. There was no noise inside the house that Lily could hear over the rain and the rushing water out of the roof gutters. The heavy faded curtain in the window near the door did not move. Lily determined that it had not moved in some time because there was a heavy layer of dust visible on its surface. A further sign of poor housekeeping was the sizable collection of dead flies visible on the sill inside the house.

Lily was contemplating the flies and the symbolic significance that there was no escape from Spinner's End, when Severus joined her on the step. Contradicting the evidence, he muttered, "My mother is home."

Severus ran his hand down the front of the door and then opened it enough to stick his head in. "Come on," he hissed as he grabbed Lily's hand and pulled her in behind him. Once Severus shut the door behind them, it was dark with a faint line of light at the bottom of the dusty drape. He was still holding her hand and pulled Lily along. There was a definite odor in the air. Lily could only guess that it was stale vomit, and used the hand that Severus wasn't holding to pull the neck of the soaked jumper up over her nose.

There was a pause as Severus opened a door and then closed it once they went through. Still dark and still smelly were the only things Lily perceived before Severus whispered, "Stairs," and she felt him move forward and pull her from an upward angle as he went up the first riser, leading the way.

At the top, another door was opened and Lily could once again see. The weak light leaking through was yellowish from the heavy layer of dirt caked on the single, thin window. It was a small bedroom with a slender bed against the left hand wall, a school trunk turned on its end to fit, a tall skinny dresser, and an old-fashioned washstand lined up on the opposing wall. Severus pulled Lily further into the room, closed the door, and then slid a thick metal bolt into place, locking the door from the inside.

Lily felt an irrational fear when that bolt clunked into place. Severus was allowed into her bedroom to play (at first), and a few years ago, her parents had asked her to keep the door open or ajar whenever he was in there with her. It hadn't been a problem, and she had never bothered to mention that rule to Severus. It seemed rather silly to be thinking about her parents' rules under another roof.

Severus turned away from the door and waved his wand to cast a drying charm on Lily, then himself. He continued to stand with his back to the door, watching Lily.

Lily's only perceived blessing was the lack of vomit smell in this room. Somehow she knew that if she mentioned it in order to complement Severus that he wouldn't be amused, but that was really the only positive thing she could think of so she remained silent, turning to move closer to the window and looking outside. It was still a downpour, and Spinner's End looked miserable and filthy.

At least there were no dead flies on this window sill, she thought, and turned her glance to the right to the washstand next the window. Initially Lily had thought it odd that an old washstand was crammed into a room this small, but now she realized that Severus actually utilized it. There was a removable, ivory-colored, chipped porcelain basin that had some visible stained cracks. The basin was currently empty, and there was no visible source of water to fill it. There was a brownish yellow hunk of soap covered in dried bubbles laying atop a discolored section of the waist-high wooden stand that had a hole in the middle to hold the basin in place. The small hand towel and flannel could probably have been called dinghy years ago. Her mother had old toothbrushes that she used to clean grout that looked less worn than Severus', and being life-long user of toothpaste, it wasn't until today that Lily discovered there was an alternate product called tooth powder.

At some point during her inspection, Severus had moved to sit on the edge of the bed. His gaze was concentrated straight ahead on the top of his trunk. Lily went over and sat next to him. She looked towards him and then focused her attention to the shiny red burn scar inside his left elbow. It was old, and she remembered she had first seen it before they even went to Hogwart's.

Things weren't adding up. Petunia, the source of all neighborhood gossip, admitted grudgingly that Severus' father did work. So how could this level of poverty be explained? Lily didn't even know people in Britain still lived like this. And here she was thoughtlessly demanding admittance to his house … like there hadn't been years of clues. She couldn't even blame Severus because putting these conditions in words, well it would sound like he was a liar, wouldn't it? And it's not something he could brag about.

Lily gave herself a mental pep talk – There was no other way out of this. She was going to have to lie like a rug. Suck it up like a Gryffindor, and lie well enough to fool a Slytherin. Yup, piece of cake -

Gushing feigned enthusiasm, Lily observed, "This is perfect, Severus!"

Severus' sudden dark glare at her said it all. He thought Lily was a nutter.

"We can do all the practical work for our summer assignments here, and even read ahead and try some new spells out. It's just so unfair that students with magical parents get to practice over the holiday."

Slowly Severus spelled out what he thought Lily was saying. "You want to sneak into my bedroom to practice schoolwork?"

"Yeeeesss, but it sounds kind of … y'know, when you say it like that. Do you think your mum will be alright with it? Maybe she can give us a couple pointers on the trickier wand movements?"

The 'you're a nutter' look was back as he answered, "I don't think so."

"You think she'd be that strict about you having a friend over?"

"Oh no. I meant 'no' to the foolish wand waving. I don't think she'll care if you're in the house as long as we don't disturb her."

"You'll ask then?" Lily pressed. She could only imagine the trouble she'd be in if she snuck some strange boy into the Evans' house and up to her bedroom.

"Yeah. It might have to wait until I find her in a receptive mood to such a proposal."

"Alright."

"And you'll have to get out of the house quick if my father comes home early. He's predictable, and loud enough that we'll have some warning." Severus shifted uncomfortably then said, "I have to go out back. Slide the bolt after I leave the room. I'll knock when I return."

"Out back?"

"The yard," he replied with a vague hand gesture towards the back of the house.

When Lily scrunched her face in confusion, Severus elaborated, "Your mother served me three cups of tea earlier."

That got the lightbulb to shine over Lily's head. No wonder Severus thought she was a nutter for calling his house perfect.

After Severus slipped out and Lily rebolted the door, she looked through his dresser drawers. He'd probably expect it, knowing Severus, so she'd hate to disappoint him. Obviously the King of Slytherin was too smart to keep his secret plans to take over the world with his undies, but with Severus, Lily knew that sometimes he would do the unexpected. Getting into the spirit of her imaginary game, Lily looked under the dresser, bed and washstand too before she heard Severus' knock.

Lily imitated the fat lady and asked, "Password?"

"Te Amo" was Severus' reply. Lily didn't recognize that as a spell, could it be a potion or ingredient?

When he came in, Severus asked, "May I have my jumper back, please?" He continued talking as he took some parchment out along with a quill and ink. "My mother's not completely bladdered yet that she'd believe you shared my keen fashion sense. She's lurking in the kitchen so I might as well see if I can get her to grunt out a 'yes'. If she doesn't today, I can ask her again tomorrow."

Lily glanced at her halter top self-consciously to make sure it was completely dry, before moving next to Severus to see what he was writing out on top of his dresser under the veiled pretense of returning his jumper. When she realized that he was writing out a letter regarding Hogsmeade, she rested her chin on his left shoulder. On the bottom, he printed clearly 'Eileen Snape' and then drew a horizontal line above it for the signature.

Once the ink was capped and the quill wiped clean, Severus turned his head slightly to press his cheek against Lily's. With a sigh, he brushed his hand against hers and asked, "Ready?"

Lily responded by stepping back, giving him some elbow room to put his shirt back on.

Severus unbolted the door, opened it, cast a _Lumos_, and stood aside to let Lily out onto the landing, before shutting the door and taking hold of her hand. When the door closed, the surrounding darkness and silence combined with the smell took over Lily's imagination to the extent that she thought Severus' _Lumos_ shrunk significantly in response. He led her back down the stairs and through that front room that had the door that opened onto the street. In the dim light of the spell, Lily saw a couple pieces of furniture and books on shelves. She was trying not to look at the floor because she suspected the source of the smell was getting closer.

The sitting room was actually small because they were already at the next door. Severus pushed it open while silently _Nox_ing his wand.

Two words immediately came to Lily's mind – Holy … Crap. She could see because the back of the kitchen had windows trying to cast some light on the dark wood surfaces. With the rain, it wasn't much light, but it was better that there was not strong light in this room. The only clear area of floor was where the door swung open, and from the way Severus turned around and put his hands on Lily's shoulders, it was clear this is where he wanted her to remain standing. The floor and horizontal surfaces were piled with empty bottles. Apparently all the same from what Lily could see. Something called Pimms No. 1. That might be adding to the different smell of this room. There was a tainted antiseptic clinging to the stale vomit miasma.

Loudly, Severus addressed the person seated at the table, "Mother."

The dark head of tangled and matted long, black hair moved slightly, and a sound of a leaking tire started, "Ssssss ..."

Rather than torturing both the speaker and listeners, Severus answered to his barely started name, "Yes."

Severus moved close to his mother, and removed a tea cup from her hand, placing it out of her reach on the table. He then put down the Hogsmeade permission letter, inked the quill, and slowly instructed, "I need you to sign this." His mother did not take the quill so he put it in her hand and assisted her with the signature.

After recapping his ink, Severus found a bottle with a bit of brown liquid remaining in it and topped off the tea cup, before putting it back in his mother's hand. He immediately lost her attention because she turned her head back to its original position to stare out the window.

"Mother," he repeated. This time he snapped his fingers just in front of her face before she noticed him, and he quickly replied, "Yes."

He pointed at Lily, said, "That …," and waited till his mother turned to look at where he indicated, " … is Lily Evans."

Lily couldn't see Mrs. Snape's face clearly because her hair was just an awful mess. She had Severus' dark eyes, but from a distance of just six feet away, they looked lifeless.

Severus slowly continued, "From school. She wants to …," Mrs. Snape turned away again, "... practice magic during the summer holiday here. Yes?"

He waited about fifteen seconds before he snapped his fingers in her face again, and repeated, "Yes?"

As he brought his fingers up to snap a third time, there was a sharp nod. Before turning away from her, Severus spent a moment looking around his mother's immediate area, and then stepped over the bottles to return to Lily.

Lily was fighting hard against nausea due to the smell, and trying hard not to let anything show on her face.

Severus did not linger in the kitchen, and led Lily back through the sitting room to the front door. The rain had let up but it was still quite grey out. He exited the house with her, and said, "You should let your parents know that you are going to be entering my house before you visit again."

AN: Te Amo is Latin for 'I love you.'


	14. Chapter 14 Stop with all the questions

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 14 Stop with all the questions

Lily felt her head was just going to explode with all the unanswered questions. It was one thing for her friend to be a 'Man of Mystery', but today really took the cake! For every one thing she found out, it seemed like a hundred more things were eating away at her brain. And the ridiculous wantwit didn't like answering questions, or gave brief inadequate answers. Except he had the nerve to ask a _huge_ question of Lily today! For someone that was so bright in class, he must have the bizarrest thought processes … how does one go from alluding that something is unsatisfactory at school and then propose marriage? Petunia would have a whole list of words to apply as a diagnosis to that situation, and Lily wouldn't be surprised if her parents came to the same conclusions.

She was even doubting the things that she thought she did know for certain. Severus had a firm cutoff time to go home 'for dinner'. Well, now that Lily had seen his kitchen, what chance was there that any food was prepared in there? She also felt a bit silly that she didn't take the time to investigate more closely. There was an old black stove in there, but it was like one of those ones Lily saw on a BBC costume drama, not in someone's actual house. The sink had been so full of bottles that she couldn't see a faucet. Was there even any running water in the house? Vaguely she remembered some grade school classmates from down by the river that referred to some pump and having a chore to get water. Lily didn't remember spotting a refrigerator, and it was unlikely that she'd be welcome in the kitchen on future visits to snoop around more.

Should have also left him locked out of his room while she snooped in his school trunk. Lily could be worrying about nothing because Severus could have it stuffed with food to last him all summer. Foolish of Lily not to have thought of that first considering how much food made it from the Hogwart's kitchen to the Gryffindor common room. Those Marauders didn't even wait for an excuse for a party, they just strolled back in and started pulling out a feast. A twenty-pound roast turkey wasn't enough for four hungry boys, they also bring up a goose, spiral ham and a side of prime rib to pick over while they goofed off under the pretense of studying. And then greasy goose and other bits of cooked flesh end up all over when they started throwing them at other students. Stupid berks even told Lily off for pointing out what wasteful gluttons and slobs they were, and then all her housemates are on her case about the unwritten rule about prefects not taking points from their own house. It's not like a prefect from another house is going to show up in the Gryffindor common room, so of course, it's part of her job. Lily clenched her fists at the thought of all the grief she got over being a prefect from her own house.

Smarting over the lack of respect, Lily jerked a couple items out of her closet and threw them on her bed to change for dinner. Dinner at the Evans was not a formal affair, but her dad wanted his girls to look … covered … for family time. Other than the bedroom door staying open, they didn't lay down any extra rules with Lily for Severus. Kind of silly anyway since they strolled around no matter how hot it got in the summer for Lily to be forced to wear more than was absolutely necessary. Although they were two sixteen-year-olds, Lily was pretty sure that they had seen enough body parts that neither was in danger of being lecherously jumped by the other. That was something else Lily owed those stinking Marauders for. She may have been able to keep her robe on, but what they had done to Severus … in front of so many people. He still hadn't said anything about it, unless that was what he so poorly trying to express earlier today. Maybe Severus didn't care. Lily could imagine if she got an insatiable desire to see _it_, not even specifically his _it, _but any boy's, she'd probably ask Severus. Wouldn't have to worry about her best friend getting the wrong idea, and he'd probably just jerk his trousers down, after an annoyed look and a long-suffering sigh to indicate to Lily how silly he thought she was being. Yes, Lily could definitely see Severus doing that for her – not that she wanted to see _it _again. Lily was saving herself for marriage and then she'd have plenty of time for that sort of thing. Oh gosh, is that why he proposed, Severus wanted to … _shag_? Lily's brow furrowed as she tried to think of anything Sev had ever said about that subject. Just brief flashes of disgust at aggressive public displays between students, and he expressed revulsion at whatever the blokes in his dorm did.

Lily arrived downstairs in time to help her mother bring food to the dining room table, and then took her seat on the side, facing Petunia, with her dad at the head, and her mother at the foot of the table, closest to the kitchen.

Once the food started moving and the initial greetings were completed, the weather was the first topic of discussion since there was an unexpected sudden rain earlier in the day. Lily waited her turn and went last to relate how the rain effected her.

"Sev and I were outside sitting under a tree ..."

Her mother commented, "Thank goodness there wasn't any lightning, dear."

"Yes," Lily agreed. "Anyway, it was raining too hard for us to stay dry there. So, uh, we went to his house so he could dry our clothes."

Petunia's look clearly conveyed her understanding that Lily didn't mean with a clothes dryer.

"And since it was still raining I went inside his house with him."

Simultaneously, her parents immediately asked two different questions - "Were you all alone in the house with Severus?" and "His father wasn't home, was he?"

Petunia was speechless with horror written across her face. What if someone saw Lily go in or come out of that place?

"Uh, that's 'no' to both. His mum was home." Lily kept silent on the weeks, months or years accumulation of booze bottles surrounding her in the kitchen. Words were insufficient, she'd need a photograph to convey what she saw. And that would only be the beginning, unless there was a magical version of that included scratch and sniff.

Her mother leaned forward expectantly. She knew Severus' mum was his magical parent. "She was in the kitchen, and when I met her, she was watching the rain coming down out the window. I was … kind of disappointed to notice she's not a good housekeeper."

If there was one womanly art that Petunia prized most highly, that was it. The radiant grin that broke out over her face was a look of triumph that hard work and constant care of a home by a mere muggle won hands down over some clod that relied on magic.

Lily's mother suggested, "Well, don't be too hard on her, Lily dear. How was she supposed to know you'd just drop by after all this time? You probably just caught her unprepared for guests."

Petunia shot her mother a disgusted look. If someone just dropped by Petunia's future dream house, she'd be ready for company before the doorbell even rang. Thank you very much.

"I guess. I even insisted Sev show me his room since I hadn't seen it before. His bed was made, and the room was very tidy. Small, but tidy."

Lily's father took this opportunity to wax poetic over his days in the Navy. "Aboard ship, that was absolutely critical. Had to keep it shipshape. Everything in its place or it would be anarchy. Severus has always struck me as a self-reliant fellow."

"Except for breakfast and lunch every day so far this summer," Petunia complained bitterly.

Her mother just sighed at the futility of getting Petunia to keep a civil tongue. Mrs. Evans could definitely say a few things herself about someone who had time to watch rain fall instead of getting some food on the table for a son that practically disappeared when he turned sideways.

"I had gotten to thinking while we were there … since Severus' mum is there, he can get a bit of practice at schoolwork in because they don't monitor whether its him or his mum doing it." Sometimes it was just so hard to try to talk in code for Petunia's delicate ears, Lily thought, as she explained. "And they wouldn't be able to tell it was me either if I did my homework there. It's only fair because all the kids at school with those parents practice over the summer. So uh, I had Sev ask his mum, and she said it was alright if I came over for that the rest of the summer." In Lily's book, vagueness was alright, but she wasn't going to tell an outright lie like Sev's mum would help them learn anything. She had no reason to doubt Sev's assessment regarding the possibility of his mum helping them out.

"Well, I wouldn't want you over there so much that you became a nuisance, Lily," her mother suggested quietly. "She's probably not used to company over all the time like us."

Lily's father's voice went a bit deep as he asked, "What about Mr. Snape – his father?"

"Severus did mention that it'd probably be best if we stopped doing homework if he came home early. Also Sev said he's loud so I guess we won't get surprised and have some sort of accident that we'll have to get sorted."

The table fell silent as this possible change was digested. Lily's explanation sounded too normal, and that's what was fueling their doubts. However, Lily's parents did trust her so their final decision was that they'd tentatively allow it. She didn't need to pull out a crystal ball to foresee that her parents were going to question her constantly over her movements. Lily was rather spoiled that till this point all she needed to say she was leaving with Severus and never bothered to specify a destination because they didn't go anywhere. Anyway, Petunia was always reporting back on what Lily was doing with that Snape boy as they wandered aimlessly around.

Since Lily had dropped such a bombshell at dinner, she let conversation take its normal course rather than trying to get even more attention with sensational tales. She now had permission from her parents to go to Sev's, if things didn't start becoming apparent real _soon, _ she's just come clean with Severus and demand he spill. Secrets could be fun, but some of this stuff was real life, not just playing around so Lily didn't feel he should leave his best friend in the dark.

After dinner, Petunia went to work at the cinema, but Lily decided that she wasn't going to let her sister get away. In fact, she was a prisoner in the ticket booth when there were no customers. Petunia was resistant to the idea that things did not go as planned today for Lily. So after a bit of sisterly argument, Lily merely resorted to her manners and thanked Petunia again for the lovely time they shared the evening before with the hope they could do more stuff like that soon.

Returning home with the reflection that people do not change overnight, Lily stayed calm and got on with writing letters to her schoolmates, and finished all she intended before turning in for the night.

Less than five minutes later, Lily was back out of bed and turned on the lamp at her desk. Some stuff that she was thinking about was so important, she thought she'd better write it down before she forgot.

1. Go to the bathroom before leaving the house.

Lily didn't think she'd forget this one, but she didn't want to take a chance that Severus would just direct her 'out back'. At least he wasn't crude about normal body functions. Gryffindor boys would have all sorts of names for whatever it is, and then probably draw pictures of it with wavy lines all around to indicate the aroma.

2. Food?

It would be bad manners to pack a picnic lunch for them, if there were already provisions made by the host. However, if Lily didn't ask, she could end up with … saltines? Did Severus even have a box of crackers?

3. Ask mom what tooth powder is

There were a whole drawer of new toothbrushes in the bathroom, but Lily didn't know if she should also take some toothpaste too, without knowing if it was better. She didn't think he'd argue over a new toothbrush, but Lily should get something ready to say about that, just in case. Soap? The Evans had lots of new bars still wrapped, but just because Lily liked pink curved bars best didn't mean that Sev's was bad. He didn't smell, and it would definitely more challenging to convince him to accept soap.

What else? Lily was sure she thought of something else while laying there. That was the whole reason she got up to make a list, so she could think about more than the bathroom arrangement, or lack of it, and get back to thinking, or better yet, sleeping.

She turned off the light and got back into bed. Heck, Lily might not even be going over there tomorrow. She wanted to, but would her impatience be so evident that Severus would suspect something?

Was he already in bed too?

What did he wear in bed? She didn't see any pajamas in his drawers.

Was he just as sleepless as Lily over today?

Was he sleepless most nights because he always thought someone was going to try to hurt him and he had to make defense plans?

Was he sleepless most nights because someone had hurt him, and he needed to go over everything in his mind to speculate how he could have done something different so he didn't get hurt?

Did he snore?

Did he hog covers or kick them off?

Was he all jabby elbows and knees?

What would it be like to marry Severus?

What did he envision for them as husband and wife? Lily hadn't thought about marriage in more than a vague sense before. She'd like a nice house with room for children. Maybe they'd go to Hogwart's too. Since between them they only had one wizarding parent, what were the chances? Although they'd have to do _that_ as the first step to have children, well the second step after getting married, of course. And now darn it, Lily was thinking about _it_ again. She hoped the Marauders burned in hell. Till just after the DADA OWL, Lily was fine. Now she kept thinking about Sev's _thing_. She was smart enough to know what's what, but it was all a lot simpler a month ago. And then all those idiots talking about snakes and hippogriffs, like that meant anything about anything. If people didn't like some guy, they'd insult him by insinuating his _thing _was really small. This logic was not making sense because as far as Lily knew, people did not like Severus, so why didn't they compare his to … a flobberworm? Gosh darn it, Lily realized she was turning into some kind of pervert. Just like the rest of Gryffindor house.


	15. Chapter 15 Throwing Owls Out

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 15 Tossing Owls Out

Severus had considered not coming today. He doubted it was physical fatigue that weighed him down. Although he spent the previous night mostly sleepless, it was not unusual for him being raised under the roof of Tobias Snape, or rooming with Mulciber, Avery, Wilkes and Rosier at Hogwart's. Slipping into deep sleep was perilous in either environment.

Apathy infused his being after the fraught day he experienced yesterday. Severus failed to convey how powerless and insignificant he was made to feel at school. Every facet of his life there was beyond his control while others humiliated and mocked him and the perpetrators faced no measure of justice. After being stripped naked for the amusement of a crowd, what would be the encore? Maiming ... dismemberment ... death? As long as it was done in an amusing manner while cheered by the masses, there would be no respite for him.

It was no mystery that the only thing of true worth in both his existences at home and at school was Lily Evans. Other than her, Severus needed little else. It was absurd to think she in turn needed him though. Wooing and winning her was really his only course of action at this point. Without Lily, he had nothing.

************************************

Lily was a bit ticked. Petunia was probably sulking in her room till she heard Lily and Severus leave the house. For being the older sister, she sure could act like a little kid.

Sev was already seated at what Lily considered his seat at the counter. He got in that habit years ago when her sister used to kick him under the table whenever mum looked the other way. He probably could have sat at the table again after he dropped a tree branch on her head, but Lily told him not to come around after that. She was really mad then. Tunie could have been seriously hurt, and even if someone added up all the smacks, kicks and shoves that Petunia had done to a small boy three years younger than herself, a violent response like that couldn't be justified. Lily knew more about children's wandless magic now, and understood that it wasn't completely intentional, but Severus did have a tendency to give back as good as he got.

There was nothing worth talking about in The Daily Prophet with Severus, at least with her mom around. They got a bit out of control the other day. Lily supposed that her mother could guess that people could be hurt and killed with magic. Didn't help that Severus expressed his paranoia that not even the Ministry of Magic could be trusted to not use those spells responsibly. And now, these mysterious disappearances which the Prophet couldn't be bold enough to speculate about the involvement of a_ certain _group of dark wizards. This paper was run by a pack of cowards.

"Lily, honey, you got a couple letters."

Lily's mother was already opening the kitchen window over the sink to allow the two owls entrance.

"Oh, Mary answered my letter overnight. That cute one's hers."

The second owl was big and solid black with glossy feathers that had a greenish sheen. Even though it was only an owl, Lily sensed that it was somehow annoyed at Mary's owl, and it stepped slowly over the window sill to enter like it was the Minister of Magic himself, full of disappointment that the Evans did not recognize the honor they were granted and hadn't rolled out a little red owl carpet to mark the occasion of his visit.

Ignoring her haughty brethen, Mary's Tawny launched herself across the kitchen straight towards Severus.

Taking the correspondence, he drawled, "I guess this is the joke you warned me about, Lily."

After shifting back and forth between her feet expectantly, Tawny gave up and then glided over to her friend, Lily, for a treat.

The Owl King remained at the window. It was demeaning enough to have to enter this … abode, but they really didn't expect him to wait on them, did they?

Cautiously, Mrs. Evans read the outside of the parchment with the addressee's name without touching the forbidding looking bird. "This is also for Severus."

Clearly annoyed, Severus got up and came over to retrieve the unwanted letter. The Owl King then decided to get into a staring contest with the lowly churl to whom he had made the delivery. Services were rendered, and now payment was expected.

Severus snapped at the owl, "What?" When the pompous emissary didn't take the hint quick enough, he added, "Get out."

The owl left in a huff. Clearly his mistress always said was absolutely correct, blood will out.

"Who's owl was that?" asked Lily.

Severus opened the letter, saw the ostentatious family crest atop the sheet, and then replied, "Black's."

His irritation was clear as he read the short piece of correspondence. With the intent of keeping his promise from the previous day, Severus brought the letter over to Lily. "It's a load of nonsense, and I don't know why he signed his brother's name to it. What kind of fool does he take me for?"

Just as Lily was about to take the letter from Severus' outstretched hand, he made a noise and snatched it away. "Sorry, I wasn't thinking. There's probably some sort of idiot charm on it … I'll do some reveals on it once I get home."

He laid the letter out on the table, and used the sugar, jam, salt and pepper to weigh down the corners to keep it flat for Lily.

*************

_Dear Severus,_

_I hope you don't mind me addressing you by your first name. I feel in this matter as the one in June, that we find ourselves allies._

_My brother has put it about that the the June affair was caused by you publicly professing your undying love and devotion to him. Of course this is obviously and utterly false, and I'm happy to report that no one else seems to have taken this seriously._

_Since so many others have written my parents regarding the June affair, I thought it my duty to let you know._

_Rather than facing punishment for his dishonorable lies, my brother has departed. I believe him to be residing at Potter's for the summer._

_Sincerely,_

_Regulus Black_

*************

Lily laughed, "You fancy Black?"

"His conceit really can't be so all-encompassing. That's why I think there's a charm on this. I'll probably go running over to him at the Welcoming Feast, prostrate myself before him and then spout poetry comparing his eyes to River Goyt."

"Goyt?" Lily asked, wrinkling her nose at the thought of their local river.

"Well, that's the only reason why I know the charm's not already in effect. I'm not thinking anything nice about Black."

"That's a relief. I was afraid we'd have to travel to Potter's so you can surprise Black by singing to him outside his bedroom window. Or would you prefer to give an impassioned speech? They don't know any Shakespeare so you'd not even have to write something original," Lily commented, before launching into an ardent soliloquy -

_But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks?  
It is the east, and Sirius is the sun.  
Arise, fair sun ..._

Severus' open laugh at Lily's imagined outing for him to seduce Sirius Black, caused her to stop and laugh in response.

He was still laughing while folding the letter to stick in his trouser pocket. Holding up the second letter, he asked with amusement, "Is Mary MacDonald going to be write me about who fancies who too?"

"Maybe she's charmed it so you can just crawl over a couple seats once you've done with Sirius, and lay some poetry at her feet too."

He rolled his eyes at the thought and opened the letter. Rather than waiting for Severus to read it through first, Lily stood beside him and pulled it slightly so he'd hold it between them.

*************

_Hi there!_

_We really do hope you don't find this too silly for us to write you for advice, Severus. _

_Us girls have decided we really cannot stand being cloistered away by the foul trolls of our house – by that we mean Black, Potter, Pettigrew and Lupin. They are conceited troglodytes and think they can tell us who the two of us and Lily may associate with. That's why we decided to write you, Severus – Lily's true friend who is brave enough to face overwhelming odds. _

_We are interested in knowing if your mates, Rosier and Wilkinson, would be amenable to joining us in our train compartment for the journey back to Hogwart's on September 1st. That would be a lovely opportunity to get to know each other. We're sad to say that after five years as classmates, we do not know many young gentlemen well at the school outside of Gryffindor house. It's quite unfortunate._

_Of course, if the two gentlemen suggested are already occupied with other young ladies, we would fully understand. We're not the sort of girls that would try to break up a perfectly content pair on a whim. _

_Hopefully, Lily will readily vouch for our characters in order for you to recommend us to your friends._

_P.S. We have a history with Mulciber and Avery. Please do not bother recommending them to us as alternates._

_Yours in the hopes of future friendship,_

_Helen Mary_

*************

"I'm not understanding the joke," commented Severus.

Lily was puzzled as well. "Uh … they didn't discuss this with me. I do know the Gryffindor ladies were going to snub those four boys off after those jinxes. This has got to be a response to that. It's worse for us because the three of us got classes with those toerags."

"Not all the time now. They spent so much time screwing around during OWLs, they'll be lucky to get into any advanced classes."

"Ain't that the truth!"

"I can write them, and copy this letter to let them know that this wasn't my idea. I'll leave the postscript off."

"Is there a reason why this wouldn't be a good idea?" Lily asked. "I don't really know them myself so _we_ are relying on your judgement, Sev."

After a moment of thought, he replied, "Mulciber … would be a bad idea."

Lily recalled that both Mary and Helen had wizarding parents so there wouldn't be that blood nonsense.

"Alright, you can borrow my owl," Lily suggested, knowing Severus didn't have one of his own. She could talk to Sev more before sending the letters without her mum overhearing.

She then said, "So, how about we go to your house and test out Black's letter? I asked my parents last night about coming over to practice."

When Severus looked at Mrs. Evans to confirm that Lily's parents had lost their minds, she smiled and said, "It's so nice of your mother to allow Lily over, Severus. And Lily, don't stay there too late and make a nuisance of yourself."

"Should I bring anything, Sev?

Not understanding what Lily meant, he suggested, "Your wand?"

She gave Severus a hard stare to try to get her real message across, and answered, "Right. I'll just run up and get that."

After Lily used the bathroom, put a couple toothbrushes and a tube of paste in a cloth bag and was looking around her room for something else to fill up the bag a bit, her mother drifted in under the pretense of tidying up.

"Honey, that was a bit pushy just grabbing that letter from him because it was from a girl."

"Sev doesn't care if I read his letters."

"That's not the point, dear. And there's probably a lot of private stuff in your letters from me and your girlfriends that you shouldn't be sharing with a _boy_."

Lily made a face, "Mum! And don't think that. I don't give him my letters anyway. He'd find them boring."

"I don't think Severus finds anything about you boring, Lily."

Lily grabbed a couple schoolbooks and rolled her eyes in response to her mother.

Inspired, Lily raced down the stairs to Severus in the kitchen, and bluntly asked, "Should I bring a bit of a snack too?"

He shrugged in response, then said, "Whatever you want."

Taking that as permission, Lily pulled stuff out of the cupboard hurriedly, in case her mother came back to the spotless kitchen.

"Planning on staying the week?" he asked, as she forcefully pushed a bottle of juice into the already full bag.

Lily sighed dramatically and explained, "Alright, you found me out. I got this mental disorder ..."

Severus held up a hand to stop Lily, and then mildly agreed, "Yes, I know."

"Well then, I won't waste time explaining it. Here," Lily said and thrust the full bag at Severus for him to carry.


	16. Chapter 16 Yield the Information

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 16 Yield the Information You Conceal

Lily was itching to get a crack at Black's letter, but she was polite and let Severus try first. After all, it was addressed to him.

They were safely bolted into Severus' bedroom, with Lily's bag of loot sitting atop his sideways school trunk. Considering there was no place else to sit, they were sitting down on the edge of the bed with the letter unfolded between them.

Severus went first, tapping the parchment with his wand. "Reveal yourself."

Lily took a turn. "Show yourself!"

"Isn't that what I said?" he asked with a smirk when nothing happened as a result of Lily's spell.

"Oh ha ha"

Severus stretched his arms out in a show of preparation, audibly let out a breath, and then addressed the reluctant parchment, hitting it with his wand, "Severus Snape, to whom this letter is addressed, commands you to yield the information you conceal!"

Lily leaned down to pointedly inspect the letter closely. It was Lily's turn to smirk at her adversary, as she pinched the corner of the missive and lifted it in the air, while pretending to give it a very thorough examination.

"What are you doing?"

"Well, after that spell," she replied, "I'm sure there's nothing hidden. You did _command_ it, so surely it's clear as glass now." With a big grin, Lily hit it with her wand and transfigured it into a pane of glass.

Severus made an annoyed sound in his throat, grabbed the glass and said, "You shouldn't be so careless."

"I'm not. You've had it for over an hour now, and you are still alive, Sev."

He sighed in reply, transfigured it back to parchment and pulled a deep metal bowl out from under his dresser.

Lily was suspicious. That bowl wasn't there yesterday.

The paper was thrown in, and then Severus cast _Incendio. _

"I wasn't done with it yet," complained Lily.

Severus didn't respond immediately. Being paper, the letter was quickly consumed and the fire burned itself out. As he pushed the bowl back under, he muttered, "If you need to go, tell me and I'll leave. You can use this and then cast _evanesco_."

"Uh … thanks," Lily replied in an equally low voice.

Rather than further discussing the solution, Severus changed the topic. "You brought books to work on something specific?"

"We didn't cover those last few chapters in our Charms textbook. There looked like there were some good ones there when I was flipping through it last week."

Lily got the book out, and the two of them occupied themselves for hours without mishap.

For a while, Lily had wanted to check the time. She resisted because it might seem rude or make Sev think she was bored. She wasn't bored, just distracted by hunger. Unable to bear it any longer, Lily cast it and saw it was past one. Her mother served lunch promptly at noon every day.

Although the time was hanging in the air right in front of them, Severus ignored it and was flipping to the next spell in the book.

There was no point in Lily trying to outwait Severus Snape when it came to food. For years, it was always Lily who insisted on eating. Severus did not openly show when he needed anything, he just made it look convenient for him to eat when Lily did.

She reached for the book, and he allowed her to close it and take it out of his hands. Lily kept her request simple with, "I'm hungry."

His eyes looked at Lily's bag briefly before he looked at her. "I have a few tins, if you're interested."

Severus got up and opened a bureau drawer. There had been no food in any of the drawers yesterday when Lily searched.

Given the choice between peaches, mixed fruit or pears, Lily tapped the mixed fruit can, and he returned the other two and pulled out a can opener. In no time, it was open and he transfigured the lid into a spoon, and handed both to Lily. He then returned to his seat on the bed.

Lily had not been expecting a banquet, she thought as she enjoyed the mixed fruit. Although Severus probably didn't expect her back the next day, he had gone through the trouble of getting some food and … a chamberpot. If he truly was reluctant to have her here, she doubted he would have bothered making the effort.

It didn't take Lily long to finish the small can. As she spooned the last piece into her mouth, she asked, "Have you ever tried spray cheese?"

"What's that?" he asked.

"Cheese in a can that you squirt on crackers."

"Cheese does not squirt," he replied with a pained expression.

"Sure it does," Lily replied, and pulled a box of cream crackers and a can of cheese out of her bag.

She handed Severus the can while she sat back down and opened the cracker package.

"I don't think this is really cheese."

Lily huffed and said, "Stop reading it." She grabbed the can back because Severus was reading the small print. She hated how he checked out the ingredients because then he'd point out something to her mum, and then it would never show up in the Evans' household again, unless her dad asked for it special.

She gave it a couple shakes, got the top off and then pressed the button to ooze an orange pile onto a cracker. Satisfied with the towering spiral, Lily pushed the cracker at Severus and added the word, "Here," when he didn't take it immediately.

A second cracker was prepared, and Lily took note that Severus was still studying the first one.

"Don't be a chicken. Live a bit," Lily recommended, then popped her cracker into her mouth. After a couple chews, she added, "Mmm Mmm."

Severus took a sample bite as Lily filled another cracker for herself. To think, Severus would drink a potion containing eyeballs, but was weirded out by … Lily looked at the label as she squeezed out more cheese onto yet another cracker … sodium triphosphate.

When Lily tried to push another cracker on him, Severus replied, "No thank you."

"Suit yourself," Lily murmured and ate it. She returned those items to her bag, and pulled out a package of dried figs. Severus didn't object to Lily sharing those so they finished the package between them. They were a bit sweet, so Lily also opened the juice with Severus transfiguring some cups.

She dawdled a bit with the tidying up, and had her Defense textbook out now. Lily's mouth had gone dry, despite just finishing a second cup of juice. What seemed like such a simple idea this morning now unnerved her with Severus sitting behind her … locked in the same room … his bedroom. It was rather moronic trying to come up with convoluted explanations. He was in Slytherin, not her. And she was in Gryffindor, and waffling over what to do. And Mr. Difficult wasn't helping with these long silences that she knew were intentionally used to keep her off balance.

Picking up her Defense book by the spine, she turned and as she expected, Severus was patiently sitting, waiting for Lily. Weakly she said, "I brought my Defense book too. We could review it, or maybe there's a book that you want to show me …?"

He shrugged, "Whatever you want to do … maybe I'll see something in our new coursework that relates to something I have."

Lily leaned back against the trunk and tried to sound nonchalant as she mentioned, "I noticed you have a red toothbrush."

He replied, "Yessss."

"You don't like red."

"I don't?"

"Uh … you don't, do you?" Lily asked, wondering if he really liked red.

"It doesn't matter."

"That's good because I brought you a blue one," Lily explained as she pulled the package out, hoping she was not about to feel really stupid.

"You brought me a toothbrush?"

"Well, if you'd prefer the pink one," Lily suggested as she pulled out the second brush, "I guess I can use the blue."

Severus just sat in confused silence.

"I would prefer the pink, because Tunie's had that color for like forever, and never gives me a turn."

As if talking to someone on the verge of a nervous breakdown, Severus agreed slowly and calmly, "You can have the pink one."

"Great. I didn't know if I'd like powder, so I brought a tube of toothpaste." Lily's courage faltered so she busied herself with opening the pink toothbrush package, seemingly giving it her full attention. "And if you like, you could use that too so if we got around to kissing … we uh, wouldn't get distracted by … well, that's what I heard."

"Kissing?" was repeated in a strained voice.

Lily looked away from her toothbrush at Severus. He looked tense and his shoulders were hunched. After making a noise of discomfort, he asked, "You don't mean that giant squid kissing, do you?"

"Giant squid?"

"You know, mouths open and sucking on each other, and arms and legs flailing around like tentacles with a whole lot of noise. They do it in the halls, and all over the furniture in the common room."

"Uh … no … I mean we'd have to be … dating ... a long time before that, Sev."

Severus scrunched his face up in disgust, and said, "I don't think so. They go right from fighting and yelling at each other, to toppling together onto a divan and writhing all over."

Slytherin mating rituals, who would have guessed? Lily held up the pink toothbrush and declared brightly, "Brushing our teeth sounds much more civilized."

After a few _Aguamenti_ and a couple _Evanesco_ at the washstand, their dental hygiene was completed. Lily straightened the toothpaste between the pink and blue toothbrushes on the counter, then stood stiffly with her mouth frozen in a toothy smile. There really wasn't room for two people to brush their teeth together at this washstand.

Severus reestablished some space between them by taking a step back. "Did you want to do the kissing or Defense first?"

Lily blinked. In her dreams, she never imagined her first real kiss would be preceded by such a question. Come to think of it, Lily hadn't even dreamed of Severus and her kissing. She had no clue who she would kiss other than him though. She tilted her chin up, meeting his eyes, and suggested, "The kissing."

"Should we do it standing or sitting?"

Mentally, Lily agreed that sitting on his bed was not a good idea, however she didn't want to play Twenty Questions first. She stepped forward and growled, "Stop questioning me, Sev."

Lily grabbed Severus' shoulders and pulled at him while attempting to bring her lips up to meet his. At the same time, Severus stepped back from Lily's sudden nearness. The back of his knees hit the bed in less than a step, and Lily had tightened her grasp as he tried to escape, pushing against him in her quest to join their lips together. Severus fell backward, with Lily atop him when she refused to release her grip. Having her prey completely at her mercy now, Lily consummated the kiss by pressing her lips softly against his. It was so perfect, her knee bent, flipping her foot into the air above them with her painted toes peeking out of her sandal and pointing towards the ceiling.

She breathed deeply through her nose, feeling the side of her nose pressing against his, in addition to the continued exciting contact between their lips, and wondered when had she closed her eyes? Lily opened them because she wanted to see Severus. In less than a moment, she decided this was completely unsatisfactory. She could see his eyes were open, but her face was so close to his, that she couldn't properly look into them. Her foot drifted back down.

Continuing her tight hold on his shoulders, Lily drew her elbows in and propped herself up on Sev's chest with them, breaking the connection between their mouths. The radiance burning in his eyes controverted their complete blackness.

Lily was divided on what action she craved to do next. She did not want to take her eyes off Severus', but she dearly desired to kiss him even more. Indecisively she remained gazing into his eyes, afraid that fire would go out if she looked away. They were blazing for her alone.

Severus lay completely still, trying to ignore Lily's elbows digging into each side of his sternum, and the grip of her talons perforating his shoulders. Having experienced plenty of pain in the past, he only rated the current sensation somewhere around bothersome. Since Lily was clearly elated, he delayed pointing out that she misled him by suggesting this could be civilized.

Observing Lily's enjoyment of this, Severus filed this activity into Lily's list of matrimonial prerequisites. It would be a great help if she would just write down all the requirements for him. How was he supposed to anticipate what she wanted, if she just thought he should know without her saying anything? She never mentioned him needing to go to Hogsmeade before … wait, did that become a condition because she thought he wouldn't be able to easily accomplish it? No. No, Lily wouldn't do that to him. Why would she go through all the trouble with toothbrushes and kissing the next day unless she wanted to marry him?

Lily had the most beautiful eyes. This shade of green was perfect in every way. It was more special because nothing else in his life was this exact shade. Slytherin green was darker and lacked the inner glow. Yes, it was almost like the magic within her was secretly exposed by the light in her eyes. Severus cleared his mind of other thoughts as he concentrated on Lily's eyes, in the past he sometimes got an inkling of what she felt.

Emptiness and Lily's green eyes were interrupted by something so strong that Severus was sure at first that it was from within him, rather than just getting a glimpse from Lily. This foreign feeling took a moment for Severus to analyze. The mental identification of this being Lily's concupiscence coincided with his body responding physically.

Considering how inappropriate this was, he immediately reacted by turning on his side and shifting his back against the wall, so Lily wouldn't be the one trapped on the inside. Severus also returned her kiss with the fervent hope that she would allow the remainder of their bodies to remain separated.

Lily was pleasantly surprised when Severus decided to kiss her back and gently rolled her onto her side. This time Lily concentrated on keeping her eyes open, however she allowed her upper leg's knee to bend and flexed her foot behind her in midair. It was a lucky thing that Sev hadn't rolled her toward the wall.

He broke the kiss and that gave Lily a chance to scoot fully onto her side. Their initial fall had started them off diagonally, but since the bed was narrow, they adjusted without discussion so they were now laying on their sides, facing each other, as they frequently did when they got tired of walking around and just felt like resting and talking … or just enjoying the silence as they gazed into the other's eyes.

Not one, but two kisses! Lily's mind felt like it running in circles because she wasn't really thinking about new things, just one kiss and then the second kiss, and back to the first kiss when she kissed Sev and then the second kiss when Sev kissed her and so on … until she finally took a break and thought something else, what were they going to do now? A third kiss … well, that would be surely brilliant, but Lily didn't want to rush things or give Sev the idea that all she wanted to do was kiss him now. It wouldn't be all bad to spend some more time kissing, but they couldn't start giving into that temptation because any day now they would get their OWL results and then their schoolwork. Lily didn't want to become one of _those_ couples who did nothing but snog everywhere. Wait a tick, Sev and her were definitely not a couple. What was the word for best friends that … that … that only kissed twice. There, that didn't sound like all that big a deal. That's why they couldn't kiss a third time today because … they were best friends.

Be that as it may, Lily didn't want to practice stuff from her 5th year Defense text. She wanted to do something else … anything other than kissing with Sev. Her toes were still twitchy after the kissing. That was odd. She never heard of anyone talking about kissing a bloke and having toes that couldn't stay still. Lily let each foot flex and dropped her sandals onto the floor. So far, so good … Mr. Paranoid did not whip out his wand at the two shoes hitting the floor, Sev was just laying there, and being mature about all this. If he did that sly smirk of his, Lily would just … slap him silly. Slowly she slid her foot forward, and felt something hard? Lily pulled her foot back, and gave the object a bit of a kick.

Severus broke off eye contact to look towards the foot of the bed.

Feeling featherbrained for kicking Sev's shoe, Lily muttered, "Could you please take them off?"

She was about to question his perplexed glance, when he sat up and reached to obey her request. Lily silently waited thinking about what bothered him. Bare feet too intimate? Or were they all dirty and gross? She'd seen some pretty disgusting specimens on some lads in the Gryffindor common room. Oh gosh, why'd she have to think of that? It would be pretty tactless to sit up and examine Sev's feet now, wouldn't it? Not that she'd really fault him with the lack of … amenities at Spinner's End. He probably had more important hygiene issues on his mind than his feet, which he normally had covered.

Without giving her a clue, Severus returned to laying on his side with a small sigh and resumed his examination of Lily's eyes.

In return, Lily narrowed her eyes in thought. He would say something if they were a real fright before she touched his foot with hers, wouldn't he? Rather than plunging straight in, Lily reached for Sev's hand. It felt like a long time passed with them holding hands before Lily finally allowed her foot to tentatively quest forward. Contact was made. It was not unpleasant. That's about all Lily could determine as she lightly moved her foot along his, and then brought it to rest on top of his.

Time passed in silent companionship, with them joined by their eyes, hands and feet. Severus closed his eyes for longer than a blink a few times before Lily noticed that he was looking a bit drowsy. Interested in what would happen, Lily remained still.

Finally, his eyes did not complete their blink, and remained closed, breaking the spell between them. Lily studied Sev's face wondering if he was faking. It was pretty realistic looking when his lips parted slightly during a deep breath. They slowly opened a little more during the next couple breaths, and then his next inhalation turned into a low snore. The volume of the ones that followed varied from slight liquid sounds to deeper rumbles that lasted up to five seconds. Convinced, Lily gently removed her hand and foot, and backed off the bed.

She decided on the trunk first. Lily found it unlocked and just swung the top open, like a door, since it was resting on it narrow end. The lid scraped on an uneven spot of floor. Looking over her shoulder, she watched Sev for three snores before deciding to get back to work.

The contents were already sorted for being accessed on its side. Lily felt the uniforms carefully so they didn't unfold, but didn't feel anything. Sev's cauldron had his potions kit in it. She opened it, and didn't see anything unusual – she did see it every class as his partner so knew it well. Tucked against the side of the trunk were a couple sheathed daggers, and one blade was long enough to be almost a short sword. The scabbards did not make any of them to appear expensive-looking, but Lily slid each blade out for a quick look anyway. Hmm, how did one tell if these were special? None of them were glowing, but that might just be in stories. She could cast some charms on them to try to detect why Sev would even have them. Knowing him, it would be something odd like the sword is rubbed with garlic oil to decapitate vampires, or one of these was a silver blade to ward off a werewolf attack. His constant distrust and worries were really too much. There were laws in place to protect them, so the chance was next to nil that any of them would ever get in a fight with the worst dark creatures. Even then, they were only considered more dangerous because they were intelligent. Intelligent creatures did not pick fights with wizards. Prof. Binns taught much more about the historical danger of goblins, giants and muggles.

Lily put the blades back. She looked over the books. She pulled them out and put the textbooks aside. Some of the others were not written in English so she flipped through but didn't find any gruesome diagrams to give her a clue as to what kind of Dark Arts they contained. She only found one that was clearly a problem, and put it aside when she returned the rest of the books to the trunk, fanning the pages of his school texts to find loose notes. After looking over the rest of the loose parchments, Lily was … disappointed? relieved? Where was the Death Eater stuff all the Slytherins were supposed to have? She studied the trunk for a hidden panel since there was no lining. Doublechecked the inside of the lid. Then went back to his dresser to see what had changed since yesterday, and was frustrated to only find the addition of a few tins of fruit and a can opener.

Lily let out a slow breath, as she turned around and looked at Severus. He was still laying with his back to the wall, sleeping and snoring. She knelt down and lifted the thin, hard, lumpy mattress from her side to see if there was anything peeking out. Not completely satisfied, she shoved her hand under, and reached in up to her shoulder. Shuffling on her knees to the foot of the bed, Lily found nothing.

Her face scrunched in hard thought. Lily was missing something. She just knew it.

Distraction set in, Severus' bare feet were directly in front of her. Like the rest of him, they were bony with the skin appearing stretched to fit, reflecting an unhealthy shade of yellow, except down here Lily could see the bluish outline of veins that bulged over the bones. In all honesty, they were ugly. However, they were merely ugly. They were not covered in filth, and his toe nails were clean and trimmed.

Not revolted yet, Lily leaned closer to them. Uninjured … not smelly … and there were a few black hairs visible on each toe, even on the little piggy toes. There was a few sparse hairs at the base of his ankles. She reached her hand to them and pushed the trouser leg up to see more.

His foot kicked out, Lily's arm was hit and she fell back on the floor before it reached her face. Severus was propped up on his left elbow, with his wand in his right hand. His eyes met Lily's briefly before continuing to scan for a threat. Letting out a breath, he asked searchingly, "What...?"

"Me," Lily huffed, shifting to a more comfortable position before giving him a harsh glare.

Severus sat up, slipped his wand back in his jumper, and offered a hand to help Lily up.

Accepting the hand, she pulled hard enough to try to pull him off the bed, however Sev had already outmaneuvered her and had his other hand wrapped around the back of the bed to prevent Lily's predictable move.

Not surprised that Sev had prepared for that, Lily allowed herself to be pulled up and waved the Dark Arts book. "It's no shock that you are so jumpy, reading stuff like this."

He laughed, then said, "That? I keep that around as a perfect example of dunderheaded waste."

"Oh really?" Lily prodded, knowing she saw horrible things in this book. This one was in Olde Englishe and illustrated.

"Oh come on," Sev said taking the book and flipping it open to the beginning. "You have this first berk that is so full of his self-importance that he widely publishes a treatise on a spell he created to pull a person inside out through their mouth. He tried it out on a lot of muggles to write at length about the effects of the spell, and advises it is best used against enemies because with their innards exposed, they are more susceptible to disease and will slowly die in a painful manner. Since this was invented when those Plagues were going on, disease was pretty much everywhere.

"Well, as you can suspect, even wizards that don't like muggles all that much found this to be a bit much. There's more efficient ways to do people in without going through all this trouble, so none of his contemporaries recognized his genius.

"Then along comes this second bloke about eighty years later who solves what's wrong with the first spell. What you need to do is turn a person inside out through their arse. That was what was missing, so he goes ahead and publishes too," Severus chuckled, and added, "Oh yeah, if someone was going to turn me inside out, I'd be mortified if they did it out my bum instead because the physical pain alone wouldn't give me the notion that I was in trouble."

Lily frowned as Severus turned to the third section. "And then, well, I think this one is a Gryffindor adaptation." Lily took offense because Gryffindors did not turn anyone inside out.

"He thinks it's hilarious to pull the guts out through the nostrils instead so they are half out the left, and half out the right."

Lily's look of disgust increased.

"I don't know about this next one. This wizard was being sort of philosophical about the whole thing. He recommended that the victim be turned inside out through his naval. He goes on with some hokey Arithmancy to support his 'unbirth' variation."

Since Severus took Arithmancy and Lily didn't, she supposed he would be in a better position to question someone's equations.

"It wasn't until the final mastermind came up with the last variation that other uses were suggested," Severus said as he shut the book. "If a person is turned inside out, foreign objects put on them, and then turned right side back again, the objects are then inside their body. For more entertainment value, I suppose, shrunk objects are better, like our school trunks, and then resized once they are inside, and if it's big enough or an interesting shape, the victim could sort of explode."

Severus laid the book down. "Rather peculiar that wizards for centuries kept trying to improve on a dead end spell like that. And with each version, tried to present a rational argument on why it was the greatest spell ever."

Lily picked up the book to confirm it was _only_ about turning people inside out. Sev was too good a liar to just take what he said at face value.

Since no one ever believed him about anything, Severus gave Lily all the time she wanted to look through the book. He didn't even bother trying to shield her from the final variation for use on _Unfaitheful Womans, Witchs and Harlots_ which suggested yet another orifice since it was that unloved fellow that suggested putting objects into the victims to further their suffering.

While Severus was in a truthful mood, Lily decided to go for broke and asked, "What about your Death Eater things?"

"What things?"

"You're in Slytherin, Sev."

"Yes. And in case you forgot, my father is a muggle. He's not acting, he really is."

"Well, what do they do when they have their meetings?"

"What meetings? You think Y'know Who floos into the Slytherin common room and says, 'you lot get out, I'm having a secret meeting with my faithful followers' and then names everyone that can stay?"

"No. They act suspicious."

"Suspicious? It's Slytherin. If you don't act suspicious, then they suspect."

"You don't have to be so difficult, Sev."

"Lily, Y'Know Who does not share his plans with me."

"If you do find out something will you let me know?"

He shrugged, then said, "Depends."

"Hmmm. Well, I guess I should get going," Lily muttered. Not sure if she should be angry at Sev or not.

"Tomorrow's Saturday. There's a Manchester match so my father will be down the pub."

"I might be doing family things tomorrow. Tunie was nice to me for a few hours this week, and I think I should strike while I have the advantage."

AN: The use of the word 'concupiscence' … although it means sexual desire, it's used in philosophical discussions as to whether sexual desire/concupiscence is sinful. In the context of this story, the main reason for its use by Severus is that he has elevated Lily in his mind, and would not compare her to the coarseness that infuses everyone else by using a term a teen would typically use.


	17. Chapter 17 Muggles for Dummies

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

AN: Language alert. Tobias Snape has a potty mouth.

Chapter 17 – Muggles for Dummies

James shook his head, rereading Remus' last letter as he, Peter and Sirius sat on the early train together.

"I was so sure Moony'd join us at the last moment." That was the whole reason they delayed this trip till the new moon so Remus would be feeling great.

"He was always the responsible one, Prongs. Maybe if we're caught, they'll make him a Prefect again."

Peter looked scared. "Caught? I thought we were just supposed to wave our wands and jump on the Knight Bus to get away."

"Don't get your knickers all in a twist, Wormtail," Sirius replied in annoyance. "It muggles. Nothing to worry about because they don't know any better and don't see anything. And Snivelly can't say anything cause of the secrecy law."

"Hell, Padfoot, if we're lucky he'll get hauled in for Underage Magic."

"But we're on probation," Peter reminded his friends.

"At school. We're on holiday now."

"Yeah, visiting muggles because we love the Adventures of Martin Miggs."

Peter was still agitated. He didn't share their confidence, and didn't know that the only reason that they decided to bring him along without Remus was for his small animagus form.

James pulled out their maps and information to review their masterful plan. It was more for Peter's benefit, than Sirius'. Sirius had good looks and luck on his side so he didn't need to bother with plans.

************************

Lily lay in bed trying to think of what to do for a Severus-free day. Tunie had work this afternoon so messed up her original intent of trying to do some girl thing with her sister by wearing her down for hours till she relented. Perhaps she could pester all morning so they could do something tonight.

This afternoon, Lily could go to the library. Muggle books would have something about alcoholism. She should learn something first before pestering Sev. There was so much she didn't know, like when she thought of an alcoholic before, the first person that came to her mind was Sev's father, not his mother. When had she gotten that bad? Lily only saw her once before, and she seemed capable of taking care of Severus or at least somewhat. She got him to King's Cross that first time.

She had also decided that she better start trusting her best friend a bit more. If anyone who didn't know them found out that she searched through all his stuff, well, they wouldn't understand. Lily was afraid. She wasn't afraid _of_ her best friend. She was afraid _for_ her best friend, and that was alright. Even though he didn't say anything, it was obvious that Sev trusted her. Lily should try to do the same.

************************

That afternoon, Petunia was at work in the cinema's ticket booth. The Saturday matinée had already started so she was just keeping her eyes on the street wondering if one of her friends would drop by for a chat. Out of seemingly nowhere, a great big, filthy, black dog just strolled down the sidewalk outside the theater. It stopped out front and stared right at her.

Looking at her list of phone numbers, Petunia picked up the phone as it sauntered away and called the constable to report the dangerous stray dog. She was just hanging the phone up, when that filthy freak from King's Cross that called her a giraffe came walking up from the direction that the dog had just gone in.

The freak had the nerve to smile at Petunia as he came in. A sure sign that he was up to no good, she thought studying him through narrowed eyes. Rather than waiting for him to make the first move with something freaky, Petunia jabbed the panic button under her counter to ring for help from the manager. After all these months on the job, she had never needed to use it.

He leaned right up to the circular hole in the middle of her glass, and tried to ooze what he thought was charm with a sweetly uttered, "Hi." He then had the nerve to wink, before continuing, "I"m not sure if you remember me ..."

"I do," she replied, clearly conveying by her tone how well she remembered.

"Well, I was wondering … I've been thinking about you a lot since I first met you. Why don't you tell me where you live, beautiful?"

Petunia didn't know why this nasty freak would think she would tell him anything – especially not where her family lived. Did he think her simple? If he attacked Lily in some 'you know' way, for all Petunia knew, he could be a rapist. "I do not fraternize with customers on my time off," Petunia stated firmly, praying that help arrived soon.

With a slimy smirk, the freak suggested, "You don't seem like the type of girl that would have customers. You wouldn't charge me would you?"

The manager entered the lobby and saw a young man whom he did not recognize, trying to put his lips through the ticket booth window. Rather than assuming the worst, he asked, "Is there a problem out here, Miss Evans?"

"Evans!" exclaimed the freak, pulling back from the glass. "I thought your name was Snape. Where's Snape live?"

Petunia hoped her manager recognized this person as a desperate and deranged man, probably a criminal. She'd warn him, but now that Sirius had stepped back, Petunia spotted that stick poking out of his trouser pocket, and she didn't want to find out what 'you know' this freak did to young ladies.

"Snape?" her manager asked, staring at the stranger.

"Yeah, Snape. Know him? Liar, cheat, all-around bastard?"

"Mr. Snape does not frequent the cinema."

"Well, where does he frequent? I got business to settle with him."

"Try Forever United pub."

"Where's that?"

"Head towards the river, and you'll see it on the right."

Confirming that he was a right nutter, Sirius jauntily waved with a replied, "Cheerio," left.

************************

"Evans' sister?" James repeated. "You didn't say something stupid did you?"

"Naw. In fact, I asked her out so we could have a double date tonight with you and Lily, once we're done with Snivelly."

"You did?" James asked with a excited gleam lighting his eyes.

"No, thickhead. Get your head out of the clouds, Prongs. We got more important things to do."

James couldn't. He openly gawked around the muggle street, thinking of what he'd say to Lily if they happened to bump into her.

"Stop fixing your hair, Prongs."

James took his hand from his head, and took a moment to make sure his muggle clothes looked straight.

Sirius clucked, "Should'a never told you."

"There's Wormtail," James said, pointing out the rat and signalled for them to meet behind some bins so they could go over the next stage of their plan.

************************

Petunia called home during her break. Mrs. Evans let her know that Lily had gone out to visit the library, but let her daughter know that she'd have her call as soon as she got home because she said it was very important they talk.

************************

It was all set. Peter could get a bit overexcited, or unreliable. His job was to rat around outside the pub and keep a watch.

James and Sirius were going to enter the muggle pub to search for their target. They were surprised to find it so crowded on a nice, Saturday afternoon. Being sophisticated wizards, they did not comprehend why these muggles were attracted to this local watering hole. It was poorly lit, crowded, smoke-filled, smelled worse than the Hog's Head, and offered nothing in the way of entertainment. All the muggle telly boxes were showing the same moving picture of muggles chasing one rolling black and white ball over the grassy ground. The poor muggles in Forever United did not know any better so cheered and booed the game as one mindless entity.

Blending in, they imitated the locals and ordered pints, and paid using their muggle money. They had been very smart and thought to bring some for this excursion once their research revealed this was an all-muggle area.

With their drinks in their left hands, they circled and found no Severus Snape. James even handed his drink to Sirius to check the mens' room. When he returned, Sirius joked, "You still got to check the Ladies, Prongs."

James laughed, and then slipped outside to check with Peter.

Bored, Sirius changed the channel on one of the telly boxes. The picture changed to a lady doing a cooking demonstration, and the muggles around it were audibly outraged. The poor muggles had to drag a chair over to the elevated telly box to get their idea of sport back on the glass tube.

James returned and leaned in to tell Sirius, "I don't think this is the place, Padfoot. Everyone here is too old."

"Watch this," Sirius replied with a grin and targeted a different telly box, laughing when the game changed to a man displaying a bag of crisps. There was another outcry, this time from the muggles awarded the crisp ad. The ritual to adjust the telly box back to the grassy screen was repeated.

"Good one, Padfoot, but this ain't getting us Snivelly. Let's go."

"Awww, just one more. Pretty please," begged Sirius, batting his lashes at James.

"Alright," James agreed, indicating the most raucous group of muggles present to give Sirius a promise of the most indignation.

Sirius grinned and flicked the telly box to display a few young women dressed in gowns that were fashionable when his mother was a girl. As Sirius opened his mouth to bark out the first, "HA," a big muggle grabbed his wand. James' wand was plucked as he stood in confusion because this group of muggles were all staring at him and Sirius, rather than letting out simian cries of outrage over their telly box. This was a most peculiar turn of events.

The big bloke who grabbed Sirius' wand also took James' from his mate. He was intimidating at over six feet and broad with a paunch overlying muscle from long years of physical labor. He addressed them, his deep, smoke-roughened voice easily audible over the surrounding din of the pub, "Ya lads tink yaselves a couple a fuckin' smartasses comin' in here and botherin' hard-workin' folk tryin' ta enjoy da match. Me an' me mates would like ta see ya try ta do ya' little _magic tricks_ wit' these fuckin' sticks shoved sideways up ya fuckin' arses."

Both of them studied the hook-nosed, blue-eyed man with his peppered hair shaved close to his scalp. Another wizard? Somehow, they got the feeling he was not making an idle threat – some men talked big, some really meant harm, but this fellow could actually try to do it the hard way and attempt to insert things sideways and probably enjoy the effort from the cruel look in those cold, blue eyes.

Thoughts of being reasonable and explaining it was all a bit of fun died quickly, as Sirius and James realized this group of muggles were wolfishly grinning at their predicament. They also worked as a team, carrying on with the business of returning the telly box to their game, while another was chosen by their main captor and received some whispered instructions before leaving the pub.

"If ya'd take a fuckin' seat, ya still have time to enjoy da rest of da match," he suggested with a smirk, enjoying their obvious discomfort … that nose, that mouth, that smirk so familiar, yet unrecognized by the prisoners.

For their convenience, two hard-backed, armless wooden chairs were positioned with a poor viewing angle since they were almost underneath the telly box. They got a couple shoves from the crowd to help guide them.

Sirius and James quickly learned which side to cheer for, and made to understand their eyes should never veer from the telly box, no matter how uncomfortable their necks felt. Both of them silently fumed over their torture at the hands of these muggles, and thought that Peter may not be bright enough to look inside the pub to see how things were progressing.

************************

Lily phoned Petunia at the theater. Tunie was very upset and emotional, "That freak from the train station was here and was demanding to know where we lived ..."

Worried, Lily looked out the window while trying to soothe Petunia's fears. She couldn't use magic here unless lives were in danger. There was also Severus' reminder in her head that if someone else did magic around a muggleborn's house, the Ministry punished the muggleborn. Sev was mature enough not to go casting spells around the Evans, but she doubted Black would be as considerate.

************************

Did muggles allow this snoozefest to go on for days like Quidditch? They really weren't going to keep them here for the entire game? Hadn't they ever heard of the phrase 'cruel and unusual'? They could show these games in Azkaban.

At last, Wormtail finally showed the bullocks to get in here. Sirius and James saw him on the floor under the telly box gesticulating wildly and pointing behind them, like they didn't know the big, bad man had their wands. Someone was going to get his pudgy arse thrown off the top deck of the Knight Bus later.

Once Peter determined that his friends had seen him, were not going to leave their seats, or even look where he was pointing, he scuttled out of sight. He was confused why Sirius and James seemed so intent on watching this muggle game that they no longer cared that Severus Snape had entered the pub.

************************

Long ago, before Severus displayed any magical talent, he was a beloved son. One of the most important things that a father could teach his son is that the world revolved around Manchester United. Even after Severus was judged worthless, he was still tested on his knowledge of The team. Punishment was harsh for failing to retain critical knowledge. Being a smart lad, he applied himself to acquiring all the facts necessary to pass such tests.

Today presented a different challenge. One of his father's cronies was out in Spinner's End yelling for Severus to get his arse down to the pub NOW.

Severus was still a smart lad, and knew a possible beating now at the pub was preferable to a definate, much angrier beating later in the privacy of the house. Therefore, he immediately responded to the summons with all haste.

It was unquestionably a pleasant surprise to find his father's wrath targeted at Potter and Black. Of course, it would have to wait until after Manchester's expected victory.

************************

James and Sirius were genuinely happy that the team they cheered for won the game. Tentatively, they looked around expecting hard slaps to their heads to keep them facing the telly box. When no smack came, it appeared their ordeal was finally over.

Most patrons were quietly advised to finish their drinks and clear out.

The friends were shoved back into their seats when they tried to rise and leave with the crowd that was thinning. The place was clearing out now that the game was over. Among the small group still here, James and Sirius spotted Severus. Normally they would expect their nemesis to appear happy or at least smirk at their current predicament, but his face was blank.

The doors were locked, and the neon signs in the windows were turned off. Eight people were left.

James and Sirius grew expectant when the big guy handed their wands to Severus. He could hex the lot of them and set them free.

There was still no indication that Severus was enjoying himself as he cast _Stupefy_ on his fellow wizards with Black's wand.

************************

Lily was alternately looking out the front window and reading her library book, when the telephone rang.

Mrs. Evans called, "Lily," holding her hand over the receiver.

Nervous about Black harassing Tunie again, she hurried over. Her mother's face confirmed her worry, but then she quickly hissed, "It's Severus."

Although Lily should be relieved it wasn't her sister, this was even more foreboding since Severus did not have a telephone.

"Hello?"

"Evans."

"What...?"

"Do you have that number they give the muggleborns for emergencies?"

"Yes," Lily replied shakily as she pulled out the family address book. "What happened, Sev?"

"Black and Potter trashed a pub. The muggles overpowered them and threw them in the basement."

"Uh … did they say why?" Lily asked. How did Black get from threatening her sister to smashing up a pub?

"How would I know? They're the dunderheads that pick the one pub in all of Britain that my father's watching the Manchester United match in, and he's interrupted by two bastards waving … sticks … around."

"You … alright?"

Severus grunted, "Yeah. They know I'm not … with them."

Lily swallowed. She hadn't thought about that. After taking his anger out on two stickwavers, Sev's father knew where to find a third.

"What's the address there? I'll call right away."

Lily called the Ministry of Magic's telephone number given to Muggleborns because they wouldn't be on the floo system till they moved to a proper wizarding house once they became adults. In real emergencies, owls were too slow.

It rang right through to Magical Law Enforcement. She gave the impatient wizard the address and tried to give an explanation, but he brusquely replied the Ministry would sort it. Lily asked him for his name because he seemed overly rude, but he had hung up on her.

Lily clenched her fists at being treated as irrelevant. "Toerags!" she growled.

Her mother was still hovering in the kitchen doorway, knowing that Severus using a telephone must be significant. Lily's father had looked through to inquire what Lily's yell was about.

"Uh … some boys from school are causing trouble."

"I thought Severus was the only one round here," her mother mentioned.

"That's correct. These … two .. traveled here special. Probably did have a gosh darned charm on that letter!" She didn't know what she hated more, Black for sending that letter, or Sev for being right. No, she did know, Lily wanted to go kick Black's and Potter's bottoms right now. Severus would never be right if they didn't do stupid ass things.

************************

"Padfoot?"

"Hmm?"

"Are you also laying face down on a dirty floor, hurting all over?"

"No, Prongs. I'm laying on my back. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, no reason."

They tried to flex and wriggle free, and rolled over into each other in the complete darkness.

Wormtail investigated the basement thoroughly before transforming and exposing himself by whispering, "_Lumos_."

All three of them blinked in the weak light. Peter whispered frantically, "We have to get out of here."

"Really, Wormtail? I thought we'd stay for tea."

"Do you think they'll have those little crispy biscuits with the pumpkin filling, Prongs?"

"I surely hope so."

"Come on, guys," Peter whispered trying to get them to treat this as serious while he untied them with his want. "They are upstairs. There's a side door down here for deliveries."

"Thanks," James said, flexing her newly released hands. "You go back up there and get our wands."

"I'm not going back up there."

"Don't be a chicken, be a rat."

"No, they're taking the place apart. They saw me."

"So what? There's probably hundreds of rats running through these hovels," observed Sirius.

"Yeah, that's why I was almost exterminated. Snape got out 'Avada' before I dived through a hole."

"See!" said Sirius triumphantly. "I always said if there was one student capable of casting it, it would be Snivelly."

"Wait till I tell Evans," James looked equally jublilant. "Now she'll have to admit how evil he is," he stated as he imagined how things would turn out, and absently rubbed the nonexistant spot on his face where Snape had slashed him during their last fight in June.

"You won't be telling anybody till we escape," reminded Peter.

"Think we can go to Evans for help?" James suggested, not wanting to waste any time in ejecting Snape from her life.

"Oy. You think she'll be impressed with you getting beat up by a muggle? Frankly, I'm embarrassed to be seen with you myself, Prongs. If it wasn't for Moony, I'd have no need to hang with you."

Slapping his hand to his heart, James replied, "Oooh, you wound me, Padfoot. By the way, old chap, is that bruise on _your_ face a love bite?"

"Could be. I like them feisty," Sirius replied, raising his eyebrows suggestively.

Annoyed, Peter _Alohamora_'d the door. His friends were too busy joking when they were in danger. Here he was saving them, and they were talking about Remus, who wasn't a good enough friend to come. "Hurry up. We shouldn't try to signal the Knight Bus here. They might hear it."

"Muggles don't notice anything, Wormtail."

"What? Don't you two get it? None of these muggles are Martin Miggs! They steal wands, beat up wizards, and then hold them prisoner in the cellar."

Sirius waved off Peter's concerns, "Just a spot of bad luck that Snape's desperate enough to use muggles. We'll be ready for them next time."

James agreed by smashing his fish into his other hand, "Oh yeah. Snape's going down."

"Ha ha. Going down." Peter laughed. "Everybody knows he's a shirt lifter."

Sirius and James laughed and exchanged witty terms to describe that alternate lifestyle for their amusement as Peter led them away from Forever United.

Reaching the outskirts of town, Peter raised his wand to get them a ride back to James' house.

************************

The three Marauders were rather hungry by the time they reached James Potter's house via the Knight Bus late that evening. Hot chocolate was nice, but they needed some of Mrs. Potter's fine cooking. She'd whip them up a feast in no time. Sirius and James could sneak in a floo to Diagon Alley to visit Ollivander's tomorrow. No one would be the wiser but Snape, and who ever believed Snape?

Mr. and Mrs. Potter were in their sitting room, entertaining a wizard they did not know.

Seeing the boys' beaten and bedraggled appearance, Mrs. Potter rushed over, crying, "Jamie! Thank goodness you are alive. We didn't know where you were."

James escaped her grasp with an exasperated, "Mum!"

The stranger asked, "James Potter?" then "Is one of you, Sirius Black?", and then finished with "And who are you?" directed at Peter.

Great. Now he pauses for an answer. Peter panicked and a quick list of aliases went through his mind, before truthfully responding, "Peter Pettigrew."

"Excellent. Mrs. Potter had let me know you stayed over last night. I was afraid I'd have to track down a third wizard."

"Who are you?" demanded Sirius.

"Alastor Gumborl, Magical Law Enforcement."

"Mum! We were gone less than a day," James complained.

"Oh no. You don't understand. _I_ contacted your parents. May I please see your wands, boys?"

"What for?" Sirius asked belligerently.

"I'm in the middle of an investigation, and two wands were recovered. Could one of them be yours?"

"Hell yeah! We were attacked by a pack of hostile muggles this afternoon."

"Jamie!" Mrs. Potter renewed her touching and examined her son closely. "You'll have to go to St. Mungo's. Who knows what kind of infections could have gotten into those cuts."

Mr. Potter cleared his throat. "Boys, we are willing to listen to the _truth_. Did you really go to a muggle town and destroy a pub for kicks?"

"No way," Sirius denied.

"The muggles used a wizard to frame us, dad. We weren't doing anything when the muggles attacked us."

The investigator suggested, "Well, why don't you start from the beginning … the three of you were visiting this town because...?"

"We're on holiday, and enjoy Martin Miggs stories."

"OK. You three arrive in a very muggle town. Then …?"

"We were thirsty and dropped into a pub. Looked like a lot of people in there so we thought it would serve good food and drinks. We had muggle money and didn't do anything wrong."

"So the three of you are in this pub, and how did things go wrong? Did you maybe insult someone while ordering – muggles are pretty strange. Or did you boys see a pretty girl and introduce yourselves?"

Knowing they were being led into a trap by all these leading questions, Sirius said, "Well, they were smoking a lot in there, so Peter wasn't feeling so good. He went outside for some air, and James and I were just finishing and planned to join him."

James and Peter caught on quickly. None of them was an unregistered animagus _wink wink_

Peter agreed, "Yeah. They weren't even smoking pipes – it was like foul burning weeds."

James continued, "And just after he went outside, some big guy just grabbed my wand out of my pocket."

"And me too," Sirius agreed. "I can describe him perfectly, know him anywhere. Tall, and kind of fat, blue eyes, short greying black hair, big ugly nose, bad breath, horrid body odor, and oh yeah, big greasy sweat stains under his arms."

"There is no need to get flippant, Mr. Black. Either you are purposely exaggerating, or the gentleman who turned in your wands got washed up for us before we met him. Perhaps you ought to consider it was just as easy for them to be snapped in half and thrown in the bin."

"Oh!" exclaimed James. "But if he did that, then they wouldn't be able to frame us with them, would they?"

"James," warned Mr. Potter.

Gumbrol pointed at Peter suddenly, "What about your wand? You were outside getting air the whole time?"

"Well … I had gone for a bit of a stroll because I wasn't feeling well," Peter explained awkwardly. "And then when I came back I didn't see my friends, but I thought I had just missed them so walked around looking for them for a bit."

"Let me see your wand," he demanded, holding out his hand.

Peter handed it over, and Gumbrol cast _Prior Incantato _a few times, revealing the unlocking and untying charms, and _Lumos_. "Underaged magic off school grounds?"

"It was a matter of life and death. The muggles had beat up my friends, tied them up and held hostage in the cellar."

"So you entered the pub, saw the destruction, went downstairs, found and freed your friends, and unlocked the basement door for all of you to get out?"

Peter knew this guy was trying to trick him. "Uh, I'm not sure. I was scared and might have not done it just like that."

"Well, I guess I can puzzle it out from the muggle eyewitness accounts, and the order you cast your spells."

Peter did not answer, and was trying to figure out where there was a problem.

"Anyway," the investigator continued pleasantly, "you save your friends from danger. So when did this approximately happen – when you freed them?"

"About five."

Gumbrol looked at his notebook, "Hmmm, Magical Law Enforcement was called at 4:48pm. Pretty close call there, eh boys? Better to make a getaway, rather than wait for the proper authorities?"

"How were we supposed to know that someone would call you? We were in a muggle town," Sirius refuted.

Repeating his frame-up explanation, James suggested, "You should be looking at the person who flooed you." Warming up to this idea, James asserted, "That's the wizard who used our wands to break stuff, and was going to deliver you lackwits the whole neat little package of our wands and us tied up in the cellar. Never trust a Slytherin to tell something even close to the truth."

"Yeah," Sirius agreed and let the Noble House of Black attitude show. "You should be doing your job, instead of bothering us. We're the victims of this crime."

"So as victims, you ran away and hopped on the Knight Bus. You'd come home and …?"

"And what?"

"Let me clarify for you poor 'victims'. A crime is committed. Someone notifies Magical Law Enforcement. Usually it's the victims, unless of course, it's a 'frame-up'.

"Since in this case, the Law arrived, and the property of Muggles was destroyed, we felt it our duty to try to fix it. However, the joke was on us poor _lackwits_ because someone awfully clever took bits of the objects to be fixed. _Reparo_ or _an awful lot _ of transfiguration can be used when pieces are missed, but when some of the fiddly bits of muggle electrickity things are missing, we can't fix them. That means unhappy muggles.

"Now I am allowing you lot a bit of leeway out of consideration for your families, so I will grant the last favor of following up with this uh …," he scanned to see who called them, "Lily Evans who contacted us."

All three boys looked confused, and James breathed, "No."

"What about Snape?" snarled Sirius since James was deflating quickly into a miserable heap.

"Maybe after he gave us back your wands, he went to go work on that little body odor problem, Mr. Black. Must be quite a trial to have wizards blast away the pub around you, so I can't blame a muggle for panicking and breaking out into a sweat."

"What the hell you are you talking about?" Sirius demanded. "We saw Severus Snape, and he's no muggle."

"Oh, I didn't realize you meant the son. He's already gotten a warning because he took the stunners off the muggles laying on the floor and tried to fix some things. He explained that he only cast spells because his father asked and it seemed to right thing to do."

"No! He was the one casting stunners on us."

"Really? My mistake, gentlemen, I seemed to miss the part in the beginning where the three of you enter the pub, and are find your classmate in there. He is in the same year as you in Hogwart's, so I guess you'd recognize him right off, before he cast some stunners at you.

"Course, that's the whole key to unraveling this case right there, gentlemen," the lawman scarcastically speculated. "You are saying he hangs out in this particular muggle pub waiting to cast stunners at visiting wizards. And has his father and all the other muggles in there cover him with the alibi that he stays home with his sick mother?"

"Stop being a moron," Sirius accused, pointing his finger at the investigator.

"Just cut out this griffin shit!" Mr. Potter exclaimed. "I don't want to drag this through the courts. You boys are in enough trouble at school, without adding a criminal record for attacking muggles."

While Sirius was muttering, "I don't care," as Mr. Potter asked, "Can you perhaps introduce me to the owner or owners of the damaged property so I can recompense them for the damages?"

"No way!" Sirius yelled at the injustice of it all. "You can't do that. Snape won't win. We can fight this in court."

The investigator recommended, "I think you should stay out of this. None of the Snapes' property was damaged so I'm liking Mr. Potter's idea much better than your story of a 'frame-up'. That's just my advice … having seen a couple cases in the courts. I may not be able to comprehend all the big words they use, but even spoiled rich boys can't buy their way out of everything."

Sirius indignantly screamed, "I'll have your job!"

"I think you better shut your gob and let me deal with it, Black. You and Pettigrew should go home tomorrow. I'll be letting your parents know the outcome and the cost."

Peter let out a squeak. Mr. Potter never talked to them like this.

"Dad! You … they're my friends."

The boys were so upset they stopped arguing with the adults, and went to James' room without dinner to make their plans. No one defeated the Marauders.

************************

Regulus Black calmly entered his bedroom and closed the door.

Now that he was alone and out of sight, he danced in place and waved his hands in the air. He was feeling so happy, his chest hurt.

He put his hands down and took a couple deep breaths, and then walked over to his bed and flopped onto it. Regulus turned onto his back, put his hands behind his head and decided to lay here just savoring the return of Sirius Black to the house.

If that filthy half-blood, Severus Snape, was here, Regulus would … kiss him.

He had sent him a short note less than a week ago to try to keep things hot for his brother to get the crap hexed out of him the first day of school. Instead, the half-blood exceeded all expectations! Snape struck swiftly and mercilessly. Regulus didn't know how he lured Sirius to his home turf, but the outcome was his brother was thrown out of Potter's house, Potter's parents had his parents in an uproar about the Marauders attacking muggles, and Sirius was clearly unrepentant and storming around the house talking to himself about avenging himself on Snape.

It was just too delicious!

AN: Forever United has been nicely remodeled at the expense of wizards, both through transfiguration and money.


	18. Chapter 18 Liar Liar

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 18 Liar Liar

Lily had found a charmed note on her bedroom desk Saturday night when she went up for bed. At school, they were usually birds or butterflies to pass notes around class, but this was the first time she had ever seen a parchment monkey. The outrageously long, curled tail was a nice touch.

The monkey's tummy had the written message:

_L ~_

_Everything fine._

_See you Monday._

_~ S_

Sundays were Evans' family day with church, brunch, full tea and dinner with fancy dessert, all dressed in their best. Lily had already thought about running off tomorrow to go to his house to get at least the short version of the story. Sev was so sneaky sending a preemptive note. First darned Sunday after getting into his house, something big went on today, and Lily wanted answers.

And where did he learn how to make a monkey note? This was so cool. It had a nice range of movement too. Hm, maybe Lily could improve the charm once she got it out of Sev. It would be cuter if it scratched its underarms, uncurled its tail then rolled it back up, and maybe stick its tongue out too.

The note seemed content to hang out on Lily's desk. She'd let it pace around there till it lost its magic, and then put it someplace safe for keeping. Not that it was a love note … no, just a note from her best friend that she had kissed twice. Stupid of Lily to take a Saturday Sev-free. Now it'll be two whole days till she got a chance to get a third kiss. At Hogwart's, she could go fine in between Potions without talking to Severus. Sometimes she was so mad at him, they didn't even talk during lab.

************************

Impatient to talk to Severus, Lily joined her father for breakfast on Monday morning. She did not ruin dad's impression that she was down here special for him. As she ate, Lily thought it really was silly to think that Sev would be here this early. She couldn't think of a time anyone mentioned that he ate breakfast with her dad. Sometimes, her father crossed paths with him for lunch on Saturdays. Maybe she should go back upstairs after her dad left for work. Wouldn't want to give Sev a reason to smirk when he found her waiting for him, she thought as she picked up her Daily Prophet. Lily was already in the kitchen doorway to go back to her room when her mother said, "Severus will be here within five minutes."

"How do you know?"

"He doesn't come round the corner till your father's car has passed."

Lily stared out the window over the sink. Sure enough, Mrs. Evans was right. Although she knew that he didn't know that she was watching him through the kitchen curtain, he had to be intentionally aggravating her with his slow progress as he meandered a path that took him to both sides of the street, with an occasional pause to study something that caught his attention.

She folded her hands over her chest and watched Severus head to the back of her house and then, nothing. Lily stood waiting. She looked at her mother. "Oh, you wanted me to let him in, Lily?"

"Huh?"

"Severus doesn't just walk into our house," Mrs. Evans replied as she took a mug of tea over to the back door.

Lily rolled her eyes. Of course not, but normal people knock instead of lurking.

He followed her mum back in, and she asked "Well?"

As he started to sit at the counter seat, Lily corrected him, "Come sit over here," and pointed at the seat her father vacated so he wouldn't be in Petunia's way.

"Got in a bit of trouble for casting," Severus answered as he went to the seat Lily chose for him.

"What did you cast at them?"

"Oh, not them. They were already taken care of by the time I got there. My father had me fetched after that."

Lily swallowed and leaned a bit forward, waiting expectantly to hear more.

Mrs. Evans put a bowl of porridge in front of Severus while there was a pause in the conversation.

Severus knew Lily would not appreciate the duplicity of the muggle gang. Once Tobias found out from his son that these two were a couple of minted nobs, in addition to being disrespectful gits, it was child's play for the 'dumb' and 'scared' muggles to trick the superior smart wizards. These muggles had certainly never been scared of Severus, though he felt that some of his dad's mates were awed by his _Reducto_s, especially the one that reduced the entire Gents to white ceramic powder. If Potter and Black were stupid enough to let his father take their wands, then they were stupid enough for Severus to use them for all the bad 'muggle-hating' spells. He was not going to suffer a thrashing from his father for those sods to ride off laughing into the sunset on their broomsticks.

"I _Rennervated _the muggles they stunned," he said, and actually used the slightly beaten and stunned bodies of Potter and Black for that once they had been placed tied up in the basement.

"I also tried to _Reparo_ a few things, got a table and some chairs together, but a lot of things were ruined because parts had been banished." Yeah, banished to a shed two blocks over in case the plan went awry, and Severus was left _Reparo'_ing everything himself.

"Why would they banish anything?"

"They're berks. When it's easy for another wizard to _Reparo_ something, and they don't want it fixed, that's all they need to do to keep it broke. Magical Law Enforcement and some other Ministry workers had to do a lot of transfiguration. Made Forever United look posh," Severus added with a laugh.

"That's so wrong!" Lily said indignantly. "Bad enough they were breaking up a muggle place of business, but to try to make it so wizards couldn't fix it, that's just atrocious."

"Yes," Severus agreed while keeping his face blank. He then added, "I was really surprised when I found out Potter's father went round the pub and offered to pay for anything that couldn't be sorted."

"Really?"

"Yes."

"Why's James such a toerag then if his dad's a decent sort?"

Severus shrugged in response.

"Was it a lot?"

"I think it just turned out to be new televisions and some of the bar taps. The owner was tickled by some of the transfigured items and decided to keep them as is. Somehow during the Scum's interview, they got the impression that all the muggles there knew I was a wizard due to my father and mother and let them keep their memories."

Mrs. Evans frowned at Severus' inappropriate term for the police. His father had a reputation for being a bit dodgy, but Severus had never caused the Evans any trouble.

"Is that good?"

"I think they lied because I can't imagine my father boasting about me to his mates."

"Were his mates awful to you?"

"Uh … well, I guess they could imagine if I can sort out anyone stunned by Potter and Black, that I could just as well stun them myself."

Lily laughed. She was then hit with the sober thought that if Sev really was the vindictive thug the Gryffindors said he was, why wasn't Tobias Snape restricted to eating through a straw by now?

"What about Black and Potter?"

"They ran off. They left their wands so I don't know how they got out of the cellar. I think that lot would know how to tie up a bloke, but it doesn't matter cause they got caught when they got back to Potter's. That's why his father popped round so quick, I guess."

"Why's that?"

"They didn't get there quick enough to cover their tracks. The Filth were waiting there to catch them."

"Confessed?"

Severus shrugged, "Knowing them, I doubt it. I gave their names, and with two wands here, and them missing wands, it was cheaper to pay for some tellies, rather than have to bribe their way out."

"They wouldn't! Oh, you didn't mention, how did their wands get taken away?"

"I think they underestimated muggles. Rather than running out the door like the pub was on fire, they jumped them when they started breaking things. I'm a little impressed that only two got stunned."

"It's a rough Manc pub," Lily explained before feeling tactless because Severus' father was from Manchester, and although Sev was from here, he had picked up some of the mannerisms. Not the good ones either.

Petunia decided not to wait in her room this morning till Lily and her freak friend left, and came in for breakfast.

"Who told you that you could sit at the table, freak?"

"Petunia," warned her mother.

Severus smiled and said, "Good morning, Tunie."

She sniffed as her mother served breakfast of porridge, toast, juice, tea and a soft-boiled egg.

"Do you want to go upstairs, Sev?"

Since he rarely contradicted Lily directly, he just shrugged in reply, then followed her up to her bedroom.

Lily wavered as she closed her door over, would her mother get suspicious if she closed it to just a crack? If she played her cards right, she could close it a little more each day, and it would be almost closed by the time they returned to Hogwart's.

"I wrote out those letters," he commented when she got done adjusting the door.

"One can be sent now."

"Alright. Should I seal them up then?"

"Why didn't you seal them?"

"Thought I'd save you the trouble of opening them, Lily."

Lily glared at Severus. He made her sound like a snoop. "Everyone knows you Slytherins use invisible ink and then write it in varying code based on the position of the planets, and the daily special at Florean Fortescue's."

"As long as you realize the futility then," Severus teased as he sealed the letters.

Lily opened her owl's cage, offered it a treat and then handed her over to Severus for instructions.

After the owl was let out the window, Lily said, "Prepare yourself."

"For what?"

"I'm about to kiss you, Sev, and I don't want you tipping out the window when you twitch away."

She saw his eyes glance at the door, which confirmed they were unlikely to be seen because the door's hinges were closer than the doorknob. He continued to stand still, and his eyes shifted to look directly into Lily's. Since he had nowhere to go unless he jumped on her desk, Lily decided she didn't have to clutch his shoulders this time. She placed her left hand flat in the middle of his chest, and reached behind him with her right hand, letting it hover in indecision as her lips got closer. When their lips touched, her free hand decided to land on the back of his neck, under his hair.

Severus brought his hands up to rest lightly on Lily's shoulders. Briefly, she cursed the luck that she was wearing a shirt with sleeves today, but then considered that she was touching Sev's bare skin and could slide her fingers lower and under his clothing, if she wanted. His vertebrae were bony, did hers poke out like that, or was it just the way the felt, but not the way they looked? Continuing to explore the neck above his stretched out collar, there was something raised in a straight line but it wasn't completely vertical so Lily stroked it in order to make a diagnosis, and then followed it further down into his shirt. That's where it got really confusing because she found a similar feeling line, crossing the one she was following.

Suddenly, Severus flexed his shoulders and leaned back from the waist from Lily. He removed his hands from her, and pulled her hand out of the back his shirt. "Stop it," he said with a jerk of his head, which was enough to swing his hair forward.

"What?" she asked, trying to box him in bodily as she saw him pivot to escape and put space between them. "Did I hurt you?"

"No," he replied sullenly, even as he accomplished his goal of getting out from between Lily, the desk and windows. Severus stopped a few feet away, in an open area of floor, and folded his arms over his chest. He left his head tilted forward and a little to the side, to purposely cover his face with his hair.

"Why … ?" Lily stopped verbalizing the rest of the question, can't you act normal, Sev?

Her only reply was a deep sigh with a slight sway of lank hair.

"Lily," her mother said as she opened the door without knocking. "There's someone here with questions about that phone call you made on Saturday."

Lily was confused. Severus made it sound like it was all sorted.

Flipping his hair back, Severus was equally skeptical, but asked, "Did you let him in the house already, Mrs. Evans?"

"Shouldn't I have?"

A pained look crossed his face, but he did not scold Mrs. Evans. Mildly he said, "It would have been polite for the person to write for an appointment so you and Lily would know when to anticipate the visit. There shouldn't be any need for urgency two days later for someone to show up at your door unexpected."

"I've already offered him tea," Mrs. Evans replied as she left Lily's room, expecting them to follow her downstairs.

"I'll go first, Lily. Don't be on the stairs at the same time as me, and after that we should stay physically separated, until we can confirm the identity of this visitor."

Severus' paranoia must be rubbing off, thought Lily as she grabbed her wand. He was making excellent sense, for once.

Entering the Evans' sitting room, Severus recognized the wizard from Saturday night. He had been at Forever United briefly, till it was discovered Potter and Black had run off. That did not necessarily mean it was the same wizard, or that his visit was benign.

"Mr. Snape," he said pleasantly. "We meet again. Miss Evans? I'm Alastor Gumboil, Magical Law Enforcement."

Severus stuck to the plan and stood on the opposite side of the room from where Lily sat down.

"Since you are underage, Miss Evans, I'll just wait for your mother to return before we begin. Alright?" Gumboil asked with a smile meant to relax his possible suspect.

He had turned to Severus, and started, "I may have one or two ..." pausing when Mrs. Evans came in with tea, biscuits and some toast, laid it out properly and began serving.

"As I was saying, I may have one or two questions for you, Mr. Snape, if you wish a parent to be present."

He glared at Gumboil, and pointed out, "Mrs. Evans is a parent."

Even though Mrs. Evans knew Severus could have a sarcastic sharp tongue, she was touched in a small way when he said that.

Gumboil didn't have any questions yet for Snape, so didn't bother clarifying. "I'm just following up on a minor complaint from Saturday's investigation. Really nothing of consequence, Miss Evans. However, considering the families involved, every possibility, no matter how unlikely, must be followed through."

Knowing what 'families' meant, Severus let out a weary sigh. Potter and Black were throwing their weight around, rather than admit they did something wrong. If they had waited a week, they could have claimed Lily invited them to Forever United for her sixteen and a half year birthday party. The only reason anyone ever believed their lies was that they were just so outrageous.

"You called the phone number given to Hogwart's muggleborn students during the holidays for emergency use only?"

"Yes," Lily responded. Why wouldn't he think a couple of students blowing up a muggle pub wasn't an emergency?

"Very good." Then he asked, "Were you at the pub at all?"

"No. Severus called me … I think from the pub. He gave me the address and I called once he told me there was a lot of damage caused by other students."

"Alright then. Uh, Mr. Snape, you didn't have the number to call yourself?"

"I'm not considered muggleborn, so no. I live in a muggle house with no floo, and my family does not have an owl. I was aware Lily was given a phone number years ago for an emergency."

"You didn't think that without a floo or owl, that maybe it would have been wise to also have the emergency telephone number?"

"I don't have a telephone either."

"You are not muggleborn?" Gumboil asked, circling back to an earlier piece of information.

"My mother is a witch." Severus then stated firmly, "She's rarely in good health so I think it highly presumptuous to assign her any responsibility for delinquent underaged wizards with neglectful parents that wander through the area."

"Ah, so that's why your father fetched you round, instead of her," Gumboil said with an nod, and now knowing why a number of muggles knew about witches and wizards around here. "So, Miss Evans, you were not at the pub at all, although it was suggested by Mr. Potter and Mr. Black that you were?"

Lily gasped indignantly. "Those toerags! And they are in Gryffindor with me! Filthy, lying cowards. No, I was not round the pub. I was at the library and then I was at home."

"Did you see them earlier in the day, while you were traveling to or from the library, perhaps?"

She spit out, "No." Then added, "But Black was bothering my sister, Petunia, at work. She called home to let me know, and I spent all afternoon looking out the window because if Black cast a spell near my house, I'd be the one in trouble because I'm muggleborn and underaged."

"If he's your housemate in Gryffindor, surely you don't really think he'd do something like that?"

"He sure would. They had no reason to be about here. Severus and I are the only Hogwart's students about here, and neither of us asked them round. If they hadn't been caught, us two would probably be your main suspects right now."

Severus kept his face calm. Lily was referring to the two of them as a team, and against Gryffindors.

"Possibly. Though you two have your wands, and our suspects left their wands behind. Do you happen to have you wand on you, Miss Evans?"

"Uh … yeah," she said as she handed it over.

"Do you do any magic over the summer, Miss Evans?"

Severus burst out in loud, uncharacteristic laughter. "Lily Evans? The perfect prefect break rules? Never."

Trusting Sev, Lily said, "No."

Gumboil cast a couple _Priori Incantatum_s and was answered with the charms that Lily had done last week at the Snapes'.

Lily looked at Severus. He started this lie, and he better give her a clue.

"How can you be so lame, Evans? Prof. Flitwick didn't even bother with those because no one could give a crap, but you go practicing them anyway?" With his typical smirk, he teased, "I even think they are right after the other in the fifth year charms text too. You don't even read what these do before you insist on casting every spell in the book." Severus laughed some more.

"The only reason Prof. Flitwick couldn't get to them is that we have some slower students in our class," Lily replied with a pout.

"That's OK," Gumboil interrupted, cutting off any more childish arguing, and handed Lily back her wand.

He flipped his notebook back a page. "Do you think your sister would like to provide any information regarding this case? Potter and Black did not try to deflect any blame onto her so I …"

"She's not a witch," Lily said, "but she was very upset that Black singled her out at her job at the movie theater. I'd hate to have him think he could treat other ladies like that."

"Although I'm sure your sister would supply valid testimony, I don't want to have her relive any indignity or get her hopes up that there would be any justice. These two are slicker than bicorn poo. Nothing sticks to them."

Lily knew a couple charms that would stick many things to them. (AN: I smell HP/Katamari crossover)

They completed their tea and bid farewell to Gumboil. Mrs. Evans showed their guest out.

"Really bold and courageous," Lily muttered sarcastically. "Picking on muggles and then trying to get other students who live in the town blamed."

Severus shrugged, "Rich muggles aren't any different. They're spoiled tossers who think it's their privilege to have the lesser people clean up after them. We should only be too grateful to serve them."

"Yeah, I'll serve my foot up James Potter's arse first." She wasn't going to let Potter and Black ruin her summer holidays. With any luck, their parents would take some responsibility for them and straighten them out with locking them in their palatial rooms and not serving them Grey Poupon.

Lily smirked at Severus, "Liar, liar, pants on fire."

He put his hand to his forehead in thought, "You taught me this one ..." His hand slid down to his mouth as he considered the next line, and when Lily's smile grew as she thought she had him, he replied, "Your nose is longer than a telephone wire."

"Oooh, I'll foil you next time. Mark my words," Lily threatened, as she and Severus helped clean up the tea things and returned them to the kitchen.

While Lily was thinking about what she wanted to do next - here, Sev's or just walking around, two owls arrived.

"Now what?" muttered Severus. He really didn't need any more letters about 'fancying'.

As Lily let them in, she got excited. "I think it's our test results."

"About time. Almost wasted a whole month, when we could be doing our homework."

Like Severus, Lily expected to pass enough tests to be in a number of classes. It seemed so wasteful to have sixth and seventh years that took hardly any classes. Instead of them concentrating on their strengths, they just lounged around the common room being a nuisance.

Mrs. Evans returned to the kitchen, and thanked them for clearing up the sitting room. Lily waved her unopened grades in the air to let her mom know she finally had them, and handed Sev his envelope. He retreated to his counter seat to open his without Lily ripping them out of his hand.

Lily opened hers and … well, this isn't what she expected. She wanted all Outstandings. Damn. She glanced across the kitchen, what if Sev got all O's? He was really smart at magic. Her mom wouldn't think she was dumb and wasted her time going to Hogwart's, would she? Maybe Severus would lie for Lily and tell her mom that E's were better than O's?

Lily stared at her grades:

Astronomy E

Care of Magical Creatures O

Charms O

Defense Against the Dark Arts E

Divination E

Herbology E

History of Magic O

Potions O

Transfiguration E

There was a little wait before Severus angrily said, "It's all the Marauders fault. I could have gotten an Outstanding in Transfiguration. I knew they didn't like my History of Magic essay. Expecting me to puke out whatever Binns says, without thinking."

Lily was excited, she had an Outstanding in History of Magic, and Sev didn't. Ha!

When he didn't give any more clues, Lily used the same tactic he did, and said, "I didn't have a rapport with my tester for Divination. I knew my reading was going to be off."

"Ewww … divination? Why didn't you just lie?"

"I don't make up my divination work."

"Everybody else does."

"Stop making fun of one of my favorite subjects." Severus made a face, just like Lily wanted him to. "What grades did you get, Sev?"

Rather than answering properly, he grunted and folded his grades in half.

Lily frowned. "I'll share my grades with you."

"Mmm." His grades were folded again into quarters.

"I know you tried your best. And mum knows that too," Lily suggested trying to keep her friend from sinking into those black moods of his. Severus wouldn't give her mother a hard time, would he? She fed him.

"Neither of us went for the easy Outstanding in Muggle Studies. We're already way too smart to stick metal things in electric sockets," Lily said, parroting Sev's stupid wizard argument back to him.

"I'm sure there must be more to a course than that, Lily," her mom chided.

"Not really. Electricity and batteries don't work in the school's magical field, so they can't even do anything hands on."

"It's really a waste of time," Severus commented.

"And since you think Divination is already a waste of time, Sev, I'll let you know I got an Exceeds Expectations. You next."

"I received an E in History of Magic."

"That's better than everyone that fell asleep in class," Lily said encouragingly. That couldn't be his highest grade, could it?

"I also got an E for Transfiguration."

"Me too," Lily replied. "And I need that class."

"For what?"

"For the list of NEWTs that I'll need for my career."

Seeing a confused eyebrow creep up Severus' forehead, Lily clarified, "If I want to apply for Healer training, I need a good Transfiguration grade because I'll need to be able to reverse accidents."

"Like Pomfrey?" Severus asked with a non-supportive look on his face.

"Well, no. I don't think I'd want to be a school nurse like her. I don't think I could take all that crying. When I took Willoughby, a first year, there after Black hit him with that witty Wedgie jinx that they've been casting for five years, it was horrible. Those toerags cast it so hard, that it's just not a reversal, but having to treat the injuries. He was crying a good half hour behind that curtain."

Severus shifted a bit, being the victim of that many times himself. "I can show you the charm to lift it. Being you are a prefect and should be righting things."

Mrs. Evans frowned. It seemed that some boys at Lily's school should never have left lower school till they grew up a bit. Wedgies weren't even funny among lads without magic. And ripping her Lily's blouse open for a lark wasn't either.

"So now that I told you what I was going for, what career did you and Slughorn settle on for you?"

"Huh? Why would Slughorn care? I'm not in that dosser's Slug Club."

"Your head of house should have met with you, Sev."

"I've never given him a gift, and he knows I never will. Greedy sod doesn't need more anyway. Can't even turn round in his office come mid-December."

Lily thought it more likely that Severus chose not to keep his appointment. Prof. Slughorn was quite nice and helpful to her, and always willing to take time to give her advice. She wasn't even in his house.

"Well, if you could share your grades there, Sev, maybe we can come up with something, and then we can figure out what classes we'll be in together."

He unfolded his now mangled parchment, and commented, "I'm not going to settle for less than a Chocolate Frog Card model."

Lily rolled her eyes at him and grabbed his grades, before he changed his mind.

As she flattened the parchment, she tossed hers at him now that she saw there really wasn't a list of O's here. The scoring curve must be pretty strict. The only two people that Lily knew in their year that were better than her in class were Severus and the Ravenclaw with a forehead as wide as a billboard.

Ancient Runes O

Arithmancy O

Astronomy A

Charms O

Defense Against the Dark Arts O

Herbology O

History of Magic E

Potions O

Transfiguration E

"I see you got an Outstanding in Charms," Severus said as he studied Lily's grades. "So you are as much of a swot I said you were this morning."

"Your grades are good too, Sev. Other than modeling for a profession, what would you like to do in your spare time?"

He met Lily's eyes and raised an eyebrow. Then the smirk appeared, and he complained, "There's no way I could be bothered listening all day to dunderheads who turn their wands backwards and whine about every ache and pain they feel."

"I know the perfect job for you," Lily said with a serious look, before kidding, "You could train security trolls."

"They smell bad."

"If you are going to be so particular, I'm going to have to try to find the pamphlets I picked up from my career talk."

Lily then added, "Oh sorry, mom. Here's our grades."

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James was tilting his chair back on two legs, feet resting on the table in front of him, reading Sirius' letter for the third time, as he rocked precariously. Frowning, he was disappointed that Sirius was looking through the Black family library. Sure, Padfoot was probably bored to tears with listening to his parents about the weekend's disaster and about his little brother Regulus poo'ing gold_, _ but those weren't books of joke spells.

Maybe Remus would have an idea. James was still waiting for his reply to yesterday's letter.

When he lowered his chair to the floor, the leg came down on Peter's letter. His letter was so whiny that James wouldn't be surprised if Peter started wearing knickers with Puffskeins printed on them.

************************

With a sigh, Severus put down yet another of Lily's magical career pamphlets. "You were interested in all these?"

"Not really, but I thought the variety rather thought-provoking, and I didn't know what scores I'd get on my tests then."

"Mmm," he replied, not picking up any of the pamphlets that Lily now had laid out for him.

Lily didn't know what else to do. She was telling Severus this was important, and he wasn't doing anything about it. He could easily do any of these Ministry jobs, or be a curse breaker for Gringott's.

Her friend had been moody all morning. He was a master of deflection, and made the trouble two days ago sound like it turned out alright, but there was surely something missing. "Was your father really upset on Saturday?" Lily asked.

Severus looked at her like she was daft, and replied, "It was a Manchester United match." Like that explained anything.

"Yes, but it wasn't you … interrupting it."

"I'm not the only thing that makes him angry, Lily."

"What happened at the pub after Black and Potter escaped?"

He shrugged, "Filth were already there and trying to fix up the place."

"The … muggles were happy with what they did?"

With a snort, he explained, "Yeah. The muggles described what used to be there, and then a wizard tried to transfigure it. As I said earlier, it got posh quick."

"So … once you got home what … what did you do?"

"Locked myself back in my room. What do you think? That we'd have some big laugh over it, or some teary eyed moment?"

"Uh … no, I just thought that maybe …"

"No. I got home, locked myself in my room. My father came home in a good mood so he gave my mother the hard one. He was so delighted by his fascinating day that they kept it up till almost dawn with all their loud carrying on."

Stunned, Lily slowly digested that Sev was saying his father and mother had a long, noisy celebratory shag. No, she was not understanding because that was just inconceivable. Parents of children their age didn't … do _that_ anymore.

"Well … maybe with you being locked in your room, they could have been … doing something else."

"Don't treat me like I'm an imbecile. I've seen him get his leg over enough to know what's going on."

In Lily's mind, there was a monstrous difference between hearing something and seeing _it_. She was looking for the off switch for her brain.

AN: Liar Liar lyrics for those really interested – originally Castaways, 1965 and covered by Debbie Harry, 1988. For the younger crowd, Big Comfy Couch used 'hanging from a telephone wire'


	19. Chapter 19 Time Flies

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 19 Time Flies

Prof. McGonagall's letter to Lily arrived within hours, congratulating her on good scores and suggesting that Lily choose her schedule to concentrate on six subjects.

The decision to drop Astronomy was a no-brainer. Prof. Celestial had little control over the class. Neither Severus or Lily could concentrate looking up at the stars when the Slytherins and Marauders were nearby, up on a dangerously high tower in the dark.

History of Magic was not disliked by either of them. However, they would both rather concentrate on the history of things they enjoyed, rather than Prof. Binns define it through various groups of bloodthirsty goblins. They didn't even delve into the psyche of why the goblins were out for wizard blood, other than goblins were easily took offense. Lily thought it pretty short-sighted that wizards wouldn't be respectful of the creatures that held their fortunes in the palms of their hands.

They reached an impasse on designating any other class as unnecessary. Lily liked Care of Magical Creatures and Divination. They may not be core requirements, however they did provide value. Severus was totally unreasonable. He was under the delusion that the entire world could be unlocked through Arithmancy, and forgotten secrets were just waiting to be rediscovered through Ancient Runes.

Lily thought Herbology would be worth dropping, but her friend was firm that he'd keep it, even if Lily dropped. His reason seemed flimsy, considering that many items were available for purchase, so wizards should not have to worry about maintaining gardens and greenhouses.

Finally, Lily decided she's write back to Prof. McGonagall and let her know that she'd like to take seven courses, and if it was a firm rule that she couldn't, or if she found herself overwhelmed, she'd make a change. If she started Herbology, she doubted Severus would let her not do well in it. At NEWT level, she'd probably be in many classes with her best friend now, instead of just Potions.

************************

James, Sirius, Remus and Peter were writing back and forth every day. Their letters were filled with plans for sixth year courses, what they needed to take, what was fun to take, and what would definitely not be worth taking because of too much homework.

There was no room on one sheet of parchment to include their plans of revenge against Snivelly. Only girls and ponces wrote more than one page to their mates unless they had woman troubles, and everyone knew that the Marauders never had woman troubles due to being cursed with good looks and charm.

James and Sirius were all settled since they wanted to be Aurors. They needed five NEWTs and needed to take Charms, Defense, Transfiguration, and Potions. For their fifth class, they were taking Magical Creatures because it was easy. One could get a top grade for handing Kettleburn plasters.

Peter did not score as well on the OWLs, so couldn't get into all the same classes as his mates. He didn't want to take History of Magic, but McGonagall was on his back to add one more class. The other possibility was Divination, but the homework assignments were a constant burden.

Remus did well, but was not considering becoming an Auror so the other three were working on trying to influence his final decision. He already relented on Magical Creatures and Charms so the four of them could be together. Defense was also a definite for him, and their fingers were crossed that there'd be a decent instructor for the next two years.

It would be so much easier to have them all together, rather than all these letters. James was working on his parents, but for some reason they were being irrational. Now that OWL scores were out, they'd need to go to Diagon Alley for supplies to do assignments. The four were setting up a time to meet in Diagon Alley, and then sweeten up the Potters with talk of studying hard. The plan - no jokes, no whining and no fogging up the window glass at the Quidditch supply shop.

The plan to bring the four of them together was not James' only one. Just because he's in Gryffindor doesn't mean he can't think of two things at once. Well, three things if you include Quidditch. It would be a bad idea to let Lily simmer for over a month with only lying Snivelly skulking around. He would write her, and maybe it would be more than one side of one sheet.

************************

Prof. McGonagall had written back to Lily approving seven courses with a book list for Lily to owl order from Flourish and Blotts. It was an expense for the Evans to make a mid-summer trip to London, so Lily would get the rest of school supplies when they went down a day early for the Hogwart's Express. This year they planned to spend overnight in London hotel. For now, it was questionable whether Petunia or Mr. Evans would be coming too, but Lily was hopeful.

Each instructor was supposed to write with their assignments, considering admittance to sixth year studies to their courses were based on OWL grades. Lily already had her Transfiguration assignment from Prof. McGonagall. Luckily, it was a text Severus already had from his mother's school books so Lily didn't need to wait.

It felt good to be learning something new. They spent all afternoon discussing the essay assignment in Lily's bedroom, and looked up theory in previous years' texts that supported their arguments. When they parted for the evening, both planned to write their essay that night, and the other would review it the next morning for mistakes.

Lily took extra care with her essay. Of course, the main reason being she had been bored waiting to do schoolwork, the secondary one which was really very minor, if she were to admit it, was that Severus would be reading it. During the school year, he rarely read any of her work unless they were allowed to work undisturbed together in the library. It really was a telling indicator of how many immature students were at Hogwart's because their moments together in the library had become increasingly rare.

Having received letters from both Helen and Mary, Lily now understood their odd decision to invite Slytherin boys to join them on the trip back to school. Sitting in the same compartment did not mean anyone was going out. If Rosier and Wilkes turned out to be a couple of creeps, the trip only took hours. In that time, they would also accomplish to goal of letting the Marauders know what they thought of them. The compartment had windows, and those toerags spent enough time strutting up and down the train to notice. If they passed more than twice without flying into a rage, Helen suggested they could affix a 'Do Not Disturb' parchment to the compartment window. The last reason was Severus. They didn't come out and say they wanted Lily and Severus together, but if Severus did so well against those bullies on his own, then the six of them could outdo anything the Marauders could throw at them. Lily thought it unlikely there would be any jinxes and hexes since both herself and Wilkes were prefects.

She wrote back to Helen first, agreeing with their idea. At this point, Lily had to consent because letters were already on their way to Rosier and Wilkes. The Gryffindors would have to keep up their end of the bargain, it wouldn't be honorable to back out if the boys accepted.

Her indecision was heavy as she considered what else to write about in addition to her grades. She wanted to say something about Severus, but what? They had kissed three times, and since those were Lily's only three real kisses to date, that was a big deal. She really did want advice on whether she should kiss him again. There really wasn't a truer best friend, but Severus might think something was wrong if Lily didn't kiss him again, or that Lily thought of him as more than a friend if they kissed frequently. He also made her feel more helpless because she didn't know how to aid her best friend, with the disturbed parts of his life. Lily wanted to know, but was very upset by each thing she discovered. Hiding behind schoolwork was how she was coping at the moment, but Helen and Mary had made it rather clear that they thought Sev's only appeal was his _flobberworm. _ Oh no! Lily hadn't thought about that part of Sev in days. She cursed Sirius Black, and then James Potter, and their biographer, Peter Pettigrew, and their gutless sidekick, Remus Lupin.

************************

The next morning, Lily was reading The Daily Prophet. She was interested in knowing more about the dragonpox because a case was reported in Godric's Hollow. People that lived in the area that had not had the disease before were being given the cure to prevent it spreading.

For someone that had one wizarding parent, Severus had little knowledge about the disease when Lily asked him. He knew that the victim turned green, had itchy spots, and the cure was not a lifelong protection so that's why wizards still got dragonpox.

"Potions with bad ingredients can cause it," Severus explained.

"What is the cure?" Lily asked.

"Another potion. It's not hard to make, and the ingredients are not costly so that's why they are able to blanket the surrounding area with the cure to prevent it spreading."

"Oh, no jabs?"

"Jabs?"

"You know, vaccinations that we got as kids."

"When did we get those?"

"Starting when you're a baby. The doctor gives you a needle in the arm or bum, and then there's a whole bunch more before you can go to school."

"Maybe I didn't need them. My mother taught me to read."

That's right. Sev didn't go to school with Lily and Petunia. "You got them, Sev. You just don't remember."

"I'd remember a needle. And I don't go to doctors."

"Stop kidding around. Everyone gets sick."

Severus snorted in response, "I was born and raised in filth. After that, nothing gets me sick."

"Oh ha ha," Lily replied to end the argument. He could be so difficult. What's the problem with admitting you got sick now and again? Nothing could top getting all your clothes hexed off in front of a crowd.

Mrs. Evans tutted at all the morning owls, but was also tutting at Severus' neglect. She opened the window quickly because the owls were too obvious if any of the neighbors were looking. She had already fried up a pack of bacon for them, her husband, Lily and Petunia. Severus got testy when more than tea and a bowl of porridge were forced on him in the morning.

This was a nice, well-behaved bunch who gladly gave up their letters for bacon so she could sort them into two neat piles for Lily and Severus. Mrs. Evans let the owls out one at a time, in order to try to keep up appearances. Really, if these wizard folk were so smart, they ought to think up a more civilized way of sending correspondence. Maybe save owl mail for special occasions, for tradition's sake.

Severus started by critiquing his mail first. "Did you get some barmy note from Longbottom? Why would I care if he got into the Auror program and got engaged?"

Lily giggled. It was so like Sev to suspect someone sending him good news must be crazy. "You better write him back to find out what he's up to, Sev. He could have already targeted you as his first dark wizard to bring in," she teased.

He gave the note a dark glare, and muttered, "I just may do that."

"I have the assignments for Charms and Divination. Sprout and Kettleburn wrote to welcome me to the classes, but no assignments."

"Rosier is concerned that both your roommates will favor him and it'll be awkward," Severus read aloud with a smirk. "Oh, he spent a week in Ireland. Very little in way of details."

She returned a smile, and said, "Well, I'll play the good hostess on the train to try to prevent misfortune."

They fell silent as they continued to read, and Lily grew concerned about her Divination assignment as she worriedly scanned it. One-third of her final grade would be based on this. Using four methods of accepted divination, choose two subjects, not more than one from her immediate family, preferably one male and one female, who must reside separately, and gain insight into future events regarding their lives from September till the end of May. Subjects must be in regular contact with the student to update them with the accuracy of their predictions. What the heck! Lily guessed this would separate the students who made up their assignments, rather than actually working on them. However, this was harsh.

Out of her family, her mum would be the most patient, but then she'd have to preferably pick a male as her second subject, rather than using Helen or Mary. There was also that bit about using four methods of divination. Was that a hint to use the four they were best at, or to use the most appropriate?

Her last letter was from James Potter. Lily spared a quick glance at Severus. He seemed absorbed in reading through one of his. Giving it a quick read-through, it seemed like rubbish, part apology, part denial about her blouse, part excuses putting the blame on Severus for the pub, and an invitation to join him on the Hogwart's Express. Why would he think Lily would want to spend hours trapped with the Marauders? Fart and pooh jokes just didn't do it for her. She folded and shuffled it into the middle of her correspondence. She might get around to replying later.

Severus wasn't paying her the least bit of attention, and was looking towards the ceiling, clearly deep in thought, with his lips moving silently, and holding his hand up, moving his thumb across the fingers of that hand in order.

Now that the last owl had been released, Lily quietly asked, "Mum?"

"Yes, dear?"

"I need to do my divination assignment using real people who I talk to during the school year. Would you have time to put up with me putting together my homework on you?"

"Divination is the one where you predict the future?"

"Yeah. Tea leaves, tarot cards, all that gypsy stuff."

Her mother shrugged and smiled, "Sounds like a bit of fun. Can you work it to win us the lottery, dear?"

"No, it doesn't do that."

"That's arithmancy," interrupted Severus in a superior tone.

"Really?" her mother asked, more in curiosity, rather than already planning how to spend all those pounds.

"There would be too many factors for it to be useful for something as large as a national lottery, but something smaller like a raffle with a hundred chances, definitely."

"Was that an arithmancy trance you were just in, oh idiot savant?"

He sighed, then said, "The assignment is challenging. I was trying to determine what would be a simple enough subject, without being so simple that there would be no reaction within the parameters of the assignment."

"What?" Lily asked impatiently.

"Well, like a lottery. There is a method to set up the equations, but the number of factors would make it too lengthy to practically solve. Conversely, if I chose an inanimate object, like a foundation stone of Hogwart's, due to its not moving in so long, it is highly unlikely it will move in the future. Very simple equation, but it doesn't showcase what I am capable of calculating."

"Well, of course, we'd want to showcase your skills."

"You certainly don't seem to want to display yours."

"What?" Lily asked at being insulted.

"No offense, Mrs. Evans, but it's unlikely life-changing events will effect you in the near future. It's actually better for you to have nice flat lines with no radical fluctuations. That means safety for you, your family and home."

How Lily hated it when Severus was right. "Well, I want to use my mum anyway. If my prediction does turn out to be safety, and that's what occurs, then I will have accomplished what I set out to do."

He shrugged in response.

"Right," Lily continued. "And I need a second subject, who better put his words where his mouth is and prove to be at least two times as exciting as my mum, so what time of day were you born, Sev?"

Severus made a face, and then sneered, "I have no wish to be speculated upon."

"I only want to guide you so you can end up on your chocolate frog card while you're still young, Sev."

"I can do that on my own, without you trying to drown me in gallons of leafy tea."

"Since when do I ever give you a say in things, Sev? Just give me the information or else."

Severus didn't want 'or else' from Lily. She was very stubborn and may not want to see or talk to him for days. "I'll see if my mother recalls."

"What?"

"If I can't remember jabs, then I certainly don't remember what was on the clock face when I first came out of the womb, woman," he replied in a highly annoyed tone.

"Don't take too long about it."

"Is this just a ploy to not let me look at your Transfiguration essay?"

"You wish. Prepare to be dazzled by my sheer brilliance in just two rolls, mister."

"Please, let me look at it. I can't even breathe just thinking about the honor you are about to bestow upon me."

"That's for sure," Lily agreeably replied to his taunt, and got up to head to her room so they could exchange essays.

Sev's essay was really good, except that she detected a sarcastic note in it. There is no need for sarcasm in this essay. He had included points that they had not discussed yesterday. Conversely, he said hers was fine but added that maybe an example was called for regarding this principle here, just to let McGonagall know Lily understood it completely.

Their Charms assignment was another essay. Lily's books had not arrived yet, but the text was another one that Severus' mother had used. It was good news that he hardly had to purchase books, but Lily wondered if wizarding education was progressive considering students from over thirty years ago used the same texts.

Wanting to save all her thinking energy for schoolwork, she took a chance and said, "Let's pack a lunch and go over to your house."

"Alright."

That's is? 'Alright.' Lily glared at Severus as she got her supplies together, and gave him the silent treatment as they put together some peanut butter and jam sandwiches. By the time they reached Severus' house, Lily resolved not to kiss him today. That had to be the reason he made no fuss over packing a lunch because he didn't want to waste any time coming over here and kissing.

There were stacks of books on the trunk and dresser. Younger texts, fifth year texts, sixth year texts and one more stack that at least had English on the spines and had harmless school-type titles rather than promising to contain the darkest magic.

Severus pulled out the sixth year Charms text and flipped to the section indicated by Prof. Flitwick, and sat down next to Lily on the edge of the bed. They read together and then reviewed the assignment before debating it in earnest.

Lily grimaced at Sev's fourth and fifth year Charms texts. They were just as bad as the Potions' texts she had seen for years. Scribbling in all the margins. As she suspected, it was critique and improvements to the text. If it were something personal about Severus, she might have been interested in reading the notes.

They took their lunch break, and the peanut butter hardly slowed down their discussion. All thought of Charms left Lily when Severus went over to the washstand and brushed his teeth with the blue brush and toothpaste. After finishing, he asked, "Would you like me to cast the spells while you brush, Lily?"

Having just watched him switch back and forth between his wand and toothbrush in his right hand, that didn't sound unreasonable. "Sure," she replied, silently cursing in her mind the absurd reason she thought up for giving Severus a new toothbrush.

Once Lily was done, Severus started talking about Charms again. The conversation was one-sided now that Lily was thinking about nothing else but kissing.

Her earlier dissatisfaction with Severus returned when Lily realized she had come here without using the bathroom at her house before they left. That was reminder #1 for a very good reason. It was all his fault for not arguing over lunch.

"Uh ..." Lily started, and Severus waited patiently for her to continue. "Well … could you … well... I need to ..." With her being so inarticulate, she just slid the bowl out from under the dresser.

"Right. Bolt the door. I'll go out back and then try to get that time out of mother. You don't need to hurry."

Lily made a face at him. Like she'd hurry up just because Severus was waiting. After she bolted the door, she heard the stairs creak. That was a small relief that Sev wouldn't be outside in the hall, hearing everything she did.

Now that it was just her and the large metal bowl, uh … gosh darn it, wearing a skirt or even having a set of robes over her clothes would have been better. It was not practical to remove her shorts and underwear, but that was the only solution she could think of. Half naked in Severus' bedroom and getting undignified with a bowl. She laughed thinking about Petunia – this was not a 'faint dead away' scenario, this was a 'die of shame' scenario. Her sister's imagined outrage was enough to take Lily's mind off doing the necessary and get everything sorted before Severus returned.

At least another five minutes passed before the knock and Severus' muffled Latin password sounded. He came in, after Lily unbolted the door, and said, "Six minutes past three in the morning."

That was a better answer than yes and no could acquire, did his mum knock on the table top? Lily inked up her quill and wrote down the time on her parchment. She then made notes regarding the charms essay to use later to write it.

Severus did not interrupt her use of his sixth year Charms text, pulling out an Arithmancy book to come up with a suitable subject for his assignment. He became so absorbed that he did not stop after Lily had capped her ink. It wasn't till she got up and was going through the last stack of books that he paid attention to her.

"These Ancient Rune dictionaries and Arithmancy tables are the very reason why no one sane would take them," Lily complained. She gave a shudder as she fanned through a thick book full of nothing but tables and numbers with other characters beside 0 through 9 that represented numbers.

"As you say," Severus replied, as he placed the book he was looking through on the top of the pile.

Agreeable again? Lily thought as she turned to face him and looked up into his eyes. He was not smirking or making fun of her. She stepped forward, closing the distance between them, and wrapped her arms around Severus. He stood still as she rested the side of her face against his collarbone, placing her hands flat on his back over his clothing.

"Lily?"

"Shhh. Let me hold you for a bit, Sev," she replied as she shifted her hands flat to cover more area, and tightened her hold reassuringly.

Thinking Lily was upset, Severus remained where he was because he didn't want her getting emotional and weepy. She wasn't putting her hands under his shirt this time, and her hair smelled terrific. What was disconcerting her? Too much schoolwork already? Surely Lily must know that he'd help her, even if it was drinking tea or shuffling tarot cards. Her arms were over his so Severus limited himself to moving his hands slightly forward to rest gently on her front waistband.

Lily was pleased that Severus was doing as she asked.

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Her Charms essay was completed, but Lily was not tired yet.

She had already given her owl a good going over and praised it. It had been making two deliveries a day lately with all the letters that needed to get out. It was getting quite a workout. When she was at Hogwart's, her cute little brown owl just went home and back once a week.

Picking up Potter's unanswered letter, Lily frowned. Seeing as how they were definitely not friends, she was not really obligated to answer. However, that would not be very polite, and if for some insane reason Potter thought Lily would RSVP with a 'yes' to the train trip … well, it wouldn't be nice to wait or not respond, Potter would have plenty of time to ask someone else to join him and be awed at his juvenile jokes, and pumping his arm up and down over a moist palm stuck in his armpit to make fart sounds.

What the heck? He addressed his letter to 'My dearest Lily' – toerag! And then all these lies or half-truths. Lily did not see Potter cast the jinx on her blouse, but that doesn't mean one of his lackies didn't. Probably Pettigrew. Yes, Pettigrew, because until Lily saw evidence to the contrary, Remus Lupin always was nice to her. He just needs to get away from those Marauders because they were going to end up ruining him. Maybe she would be in some classes with Lupin without those other toerags to gauge whether he was open to having other friends. Not that Lily would ever ask anyone to give up their other friends for her friendship – that just wasn't a nice thing to do.

_To James Potter -_

_I have already made plans for traveling with others on the Hogwart's Express. Even if I had not, I would not wish to sit with you._

_Your jaunt up to my hometown was most unwelcome. My sister is still quite upset over Black's harassment, and I do not think the attempt to have me get in trouble for under aged magic use over the summer the least bit amusing._

_Regards, _

_Lily Evans_

Lily could have written pages about Potter's poor behavior, but it was his parents' and teachers' job to teach him some manners, not hers.

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Regulus Black was worried about Sirius still being home. He should have taken himself off by now. He was tolerating high levels of verbal abuse from their parents, and spending all his spare time in the Black family library.

He attempted to find out what his brother was up to with his crude friends, but the two letters he intercepted were about school, of all things. Undeterred, Regulus studied them carefully to unravel the code they were using. It had to be simple enough for Pettigrew to understand.

Whenever he spied on Sirius in the library, he was openly smiling, and sometimes cackled madly about Snape. Well, Sirius didn't actually say the name, but at least Regulus knew that 'Snivellus' and anything using 'greasy' meant Snape in Marauder speak. They really were a bunch of simpletons, that's what was so annoying about not being to reveal the code in those letters.

It was one of those rare moments, when Regulus' parents paid him little heed. They were pleased that Sirius was taking an interest in his noble heritage finally. Desperate, Regulus even spoke with Phineas Nigellus' portrait, who was not the least bit helpful with his snide comments.

First off, Regulus was not troubled about Snape being a target. Yes, he was a fellow Slytherin, but did not belong because he was a halfblood. It was only because he was bloody brilliant that the Sorting Hat gave Slytherin house his talents and points. Snape also enjoyed revenge served up cold, warm and piping hot.

The real problem was Sirius. Regulus hated to see him win at anything, after all the years of getting pushed around by his big brother.

The was also the concern that Sirius was in Gryffindor. Dark Arts mixed with stupidity was a recipe for disaster. Knowing Sirius, he'd think it a bit of fun to take out Snape using _Fiendfyre_. He hadn't a subtle bone in his body.

With any luck, Sirius would delay his revenge till September. That would give Regulus some time to get advice from older Slytherins. Heck, they might even waive the halfblood thing on Snape, considering he would be a powerful ally to cultivate. No one needed to become his friend because Slytherins didn't need any. They had acquaintances, people they manipulated till they had no use anymore. Severus Snape could be damned useful.

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Lily's books arrived with the bill with both the wizarding and muggle monetary equivalent that she gave her parents so they could pay for it with a bank draft.

Lily and Severus had their Transfiguration and Charms work completed. Lily had begun on both Astrology charts, and took careful notes for a tarot reading she did for her mother. She tried to do something with her mum's palm, but that was inexact for narrowing down to less than one year of time.

They needed brew a potion for that assignment. They could set up a portable flame in Sev's bedroom and make it together, but they did not have all the ingredients between them, so that was something else that needed to be ordered via owl.

There was no word yet on Defense. Either the book or homework. Lily hoped they wouldn't be stuck with another crap instructor.

After asking Sev about his Arithmancy, Lily swore to herself, she wouldn't bother him on that again. Using known substitutes, other herbal properties, and potion disciplines, he was working out more complex or unusual substitutions for potions' ingredients that were either difficult to come by, or that had such strict collection methods that the buyer did not know their ingredients were no good until the brew blew up in their faces. The pages of calculations crossed Lily's eyes. That stuff could drive someone mad!

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Tomorrow, Peter Pettigrew would be meeting up with the fellows in Diagon Alley. The Potters would be watching the four of them, and all of them were anxious to convince James' parents that they could behave themselves, and didn't need to cause all sorts of trouble to have a bit of fun.

Peter's parents were not happy that he didn't do as well on his OWLs as he could have. He'd like to show them how good he really was by showing them his animagus form, but that was still a secret.

For now, he promised to concentrate on his schoolwork and stay out of mischief.

************************

In the evening, Lily's mother came into her room, "How is the rest of your homework going, dear?"

"Fine, mum. And we're all set for me to make us up some tea for lunch tomorrow so I can take a look at the tea leaves for you and Severus?"

"Oh yes. I'm quite looking forward to it. Find anything interesting in those cards?"

"No. I did copy down the layout exactly so if my class isn't scheduled for a few days, I can look at some other books in the library and add more. I am happy it did turn out as Severus guessed though, better to be safe than have excitement. Right?"

Mrs. Evans gave a bit of a laugh, "Of course. I was more interested in something exciting happening to my family. It's about time Petunia settled on one beau and got serious."

"Hmmm, well I guess I can try to see if Tunie will even touch my cards. It is rather more about _her_, than _you_ though, isn't it, mum?" Lily knew her parents hopes that Petunia would soon get engaged, kept them from taking a summer vacation this year. Weddings, or at least the one Petunia would want, were expensive.

"Of course, of course," her mother replied pleasantly. "What about Severus?"

"I haven't gotten to him doing the cards yet. Maybe tomorrow. We've gotten so much done already that I can really spend weeks to do this assignment proper for Divination. So much of my grade is going to depend on it.

"We're still waiting on some dried maiden's hair and grindylow teeth to brew up something for Prof. Slughorn. Since we both need to brew the same thing, we'll just whip one up, and then individually do our essays."

"You know, I've been thinking, with you spending so much time over there, Lily, maybe I should stop by and thank Mrs. Snape. At the very least."

Screaming "NO!" would not be the right answer. Complaining that Petunia was afraid her mother would be seen in Spinner's End … uh, no. Mrs. Evans would probably go there to spite Petunia and give her a lecture about behaving like Christians, and how it's their duty to help others. The truth? Hm, that might work …

"Uh … I didn't want to tell you, mum, but Mrs. Snape well … she drinks."

"Drinks?"

"A lot."

Mrs. Evans waited for Lily to explain more.

"Well, I would have said something if she were … I don't know … dangerous or loud, but she isn't."

"Is she well enough to … supervise the two of you?"

Lily made a face, then commented, "We both know that Severus is not … well-cared for. He's pretty much left on his own. So to tell the truth, no."

She interrupted her mother by continuing, "And Severus doesn't get fresh. I mean, if he and I were, you know, then we wouldn't be getting all this homework done then."

"I wasn't going to say that Severus is a fresh young man. He does say some rather shocking things, but if he were anything like his father … no, that's not right … um, he's definitely very much his own person," fumbled Mrs. Evans while trying to find the polite way of saying what she meant.

"Although Sev doesn't know what career he's going to pursue, he's very serious about his grades, mum. He's actually quite brilliant and he works hard at getting better."

"I know, that's not what I was trying to say … it's just that, sometimes … I guess the phrase they use is 'one thing led to another', Lily. Even if Severus isn't forward with you, you are both at an age where one indiscretion, could lead to a big mistake."

Lily gasped, "Mum! You aren't about to show me how to use a Durex next, are you?"

"What do you know about those?" asked her mother, now flushed and shocked.

"Never you mind. It's quite ludicrous to say that kind of stuff about Sev and I. He's ready to jump out the window whenever I touch him, if I don't warn him first."

"You touch him?"

"Not like _that, _mum," Lily responded with the proper indignant tone, and mentally thought that she was telling the truth since she and Severus didn't strip their clothes off and go rubbing themselves against each other. That would be absolutely gross, and it would probably be a race to see who barfed on the other first. Yes, that's exactly what would happen … naked + rubbing = barf.

"Of course not, dear," her mother said, calming down. "Rather insensitive of me not to think of how poor Severus doesn't like that sort of thing. Used to make me wretched whenever I got too close to him in the kitchen, and he'd jump like I was about to smack him. He's gotten better round me," her mother's voice choked a bit, "but I guess it was rather foolish of me to think that he'd … well, let someone touch him without thinking … about getting hurt."

"I wouldn't."

"Not you, Lily. I didn't mean that he'd think that you would. It's just in his head, he can't help it."

"Right," said Lily in agreement with her brain racing about with this possibility. Why didn't Sev say something? He would say something if he couldn't tolerate Lily getting next to him, right? Well, he did say he didn't want to giant squid kiss.

"Maybe it would be better if I just sent a cake round with you then, dear?"

"Huh?"

"For Mrs. Snape. If she's not fit for company?"

That certainly was a way to put it, Lily thought as she slowly answered, "Uh … why don't you ask Severus? He's not much for sweets, so maybe his mum isn't either."

************************

James took a deep, cleansing breath when he met his mates in the Leaky Cauldron, with his parents accompanying him. He had a couple questions for Sirius Black and what he said to Lily Evans' sister. Nonetheless, it just wouldn't do to start pummeling Padfoot here and now to get these answers.

He was willing to give his best friend the benefit of his doubt however. James understood that Lily was that one girl in a hundred that could resist his charm. Being Lily's sister, it's possible this other girl could be that other girl in a hundred able to resist Sirius'.

************************

Lily didn't know why she was nervous about reading tea leaves. Neither her mother nor Severus were going to tell her she was wrong. Or at least she didn't think so, until Severus flipped through her book and identified his glob of tea to look like the Grim. A troll had more of an inner eye than him.

After they finished with lunch, she set up a burner to try smoke patterns. This four different methods was some sort of trick, Lily felt. Nothing on her mother's palm looked unusual, so maybe this would shed some light on their futures. Severus allowed Lily's mother to go first, and Lily instructed her on what she could do to the cones of incense to produce the smoke. Once they got burning, Lily took notes of the patterns she recognized.

After it was burnt out, Lily asked Severus to wait while she looked up what she had seen. Ah, this was fitting the overall forecast that Lily was hoping for – home, hearth, family, health, safety … smoke patterns were good for mum then.

It turned out smoke patterns were not so good for Severus. Everything Lily thought she recognized contradicted another pattern. There were both health and illness, happiness and sorrow … rather than being helpful, Severus suggested that all he saw was one big dark blob again, so if the Grim could show up in smoke, then he had a match. What kind of idiot jokes about seeing the Grim?

Since she was doing well with one of her subjects, Lily pressed on with crystal gazing, and plunked her small crystal ball down in the middle of the kitchen table, and closed the blinds to dim the room. She asked Severus to make himself useful and take notes as she kept her eyes on the crystal and worked. When she finished, Lily was surprised that the result was five full pages of Severus' spidery handwriting.

Unfortunately, when she switched subjects, Lily drew a blank as she looked at Sev's eyes reflected in the crystal. After keeping them both still for fifteen minutes, with her mum poised to take notes the whole time, Lily admitted it wasn't working.

Refusing defeat, Lily insisted that she do a tarot card reading for Severus now. She'd work on the horoscopes for September to May tonight, and use that as her primary guide, then see how the three other tests fit. Like with her mum's reading, Lily took careful note of all the cards that got laid and their positions. Sensing Lily was becoming frustrated with his unsuitability, Severus did not tease her about any of the cards that showed up for him.

************************

Remus was having a terrific day out in Diagon Alley with his friends. He knew his three friends had gotten into deep trouble by foolishly traveling by train to where Severus Snape lived. He had tried to tell them it was a bad idea. Even though it was the new moon, instead of the full moon, when they went Remus did not go and told James he didn't want to go. It was so easy to say 'no' to the Marauders from a distance. Remus was just fortunate that they had told them why they were going, rather than joining them on a train and accidentally bumping into Snape once they got there.

That was all in the past now. The Marauders had been on their best behavior today. Confining their discussion to school for the benefit of James' parents. They had gone into every shop that caught their interest, shopped, or in Remus' case just got his school supplies, ate lunch, shopped some more, and now were enjoying ice cream.

While the boys were sitting on their own, enjoying their ice cream, James asked Sirius, "Padfoot, what did you do to Evans' sister? I got a letter 'bout it."

"What are you talking about, Prongs?"

"Didn't you tell me that you ran into her and asked her on a double date with Evans and I?"

"I told you then it was a joke."

"Right. But what did you say to her?"

"Nothing she should be mad about. Especially once I found out she was Evans' sister instead of Snape's."

"Eeewwweeee," Peter commented.

"How could you think Evans' sister was related to Snape, Padfoot? Was she … hideous?"

"No. She was just with Snape at King's Cross. How was I supposed to know, Prongs?"

Remus interjected, "Could you have said something unkind while you were under the misapprehension that she was a Snape?"

"Moony, I would never insult a lady."

"Psst," Peter said, "Parents coming."

************************

Lily was rather knackered the next day at breakfast. She was up too late working on the horoscopes, and wasn't even close to finishing. She had known that Sev was a practical, highly focused Capricorn because of his birthday, but now that she had everything else mapped out … she now knew that he was a secretive, hard to understand sort too. Kind of silly that Lily would need a birth chart to tell her that when she had known him for the past eight years. Although Sev's birth chart was a fascinating read and explained much, that wasn't the assignment. With the plotting out of future planet movements and how they would effect her mum and Severus, well her mom was fine, but if Lily read things right, this autumn would not be good to her best friend. She had to check it again, maybe ask Sev to check her math.

There was less mail, and no potions ingredients or a hint even if there was going to be a Defense class. Severus noted, "Wilkes finally answered. If yesterday's special was Marmalade Mango Mash-up at the ice cream shop, his secret message is that this train ride could rip apart the very fabric of the world as we know it, and shake-up the entire power structure within Slytherin house."

"He said that?"

"No. He hinted that a shifting of loyalties based on common interests and blah, blah, blah could mean that 6th year Slytherin males go from 4 versus 1 to 3 versus 2, with me rising into a position of power. Ha ha ha."

"I think that really is a Mash-up. What's the 4 versus 1?"

"Me against them. Mulciber is the … alpha male because he's the meanest, attacks without provocation and has connections. That is why Rosier and Wilkes don't side with me because I'm not … interested in Slytherin politics and making the right connections."

"What about what's right?"

"Right in Slytherin is about alliances, and who will owe you most and be in the best position to pay it back. You have met Horace Slughorn, haven't you?"

"Will you stop picking on Prof. Slughorn?"

"Anyway, Wilkes is intrigued by the ladies' proposition. He isn't saying 'yes' at this time, but will see how things look on Sept. 1st. He'll either join the proposed group or join Mulciber and Avery."

"That's rather … wishy-washy."

Severus shrugged, "Just thought I'd let you know so you or your friends don't make fools of yourselves chasing him down when he heads the other way."

"Oh, thanks a lot. Like I'd be running after Wilkes."

"Probably not. But you might hex him later when you see him at the Prefects' meeting."

"Would it be alright with you if I kept working on my Divination today? It's a really bigger project than I thought."

"Not at all. I have some more ideas for my Arithmancy."

************************

Things were looking up. Sirius Black would probably be welcome back to the Potters within the week. Then he could depart from this gloomy hellhole.

Sixth year was going to be their best year yet. Him and James would only have five classes to worry about, and have plenty of time for the ladies. Oh yeah. After catching that ponce Regulisp glancing at him all the time, Sirius Black was ready to feast his eyes on some prime Gryffindor tail. He just had to decide whether he'd bless either Helen or Mary, or if perhaps maybe a fifth year girl. Or maybe he should spread the love around, there were seven nights in a week, weren't there?

He'd have plenty of free time to set things up real nice when he got back to Hogwart's. Sirius already had the plan in hand to make sure Snivelly wouldn't be skulking around all the good snogging spots ready to hit him with a Stinging Hex. That hurt! And the babes weren't too forgiving and giggled like crazy when he yelped like a kicked puppy when he was hexed in his magic wand. It wasn't funny! Not the least bit funny!

Anyway, Snivelly might miss so much school that he'd have to skip a year. His best mate, James, could have a serious go at Evans without her slimy friend popping up. Considering Evans taste in friends, it might be best if Prongs got Evans out of his system.

It wasn't like Sirius was trying to kill him, and lots of people caught dragonpox. It was The Daily Prophet  that gave him the idea, a spell in one of the family's books, and the fact that there was no way it could spread out of control because muggles couldn't catch it.

All Sirius needed to do is drop it in the mail from a post office and bing! bing! bing! Pox. Hope the turd scratched his bullocks right off.

************************

Lily was finished with her mother's part of the project. She had already started copying over her mother's birth chart into colored ink for clarity. It was a good solid project on her mother with all signs showing a nice, safe year with little highpoints around Christmas, February, Easter and early May.

She needed more to complete Severus' to her satisfaction. The horoscope was clear-cut, but not very nice. He'd have a life-threatening illness in September, mortal peril in November, and seemed to live till February when he would receive a majorly favorable life-altering event. His tarot cards showed he was a person who's life was in flux, that he had real enemies actively working against him, and there minor forces of good also present but not actively working in his favor. Maybe they could try the crystal gazing again, or get a better result from a cup of tea. Would these events perhaps show up on Sev's palm? It might be worth a look.

************************

James Potter was delighted. His parents said he can invite friends over again. He didn't know how Sirius could stand it in London with his family. Up until their little trip earlier this summer, James almost had his parents convinced that Sirius should just move in with them.

Oh well, just a small setback. Sirius would come here for the rest of the summer, and then they'd be back at Hogwart's. They'd stay out of trouble, and then James could approach his parents again. Hell, maybe Sirius and him would rent a place together for the summer next year. They'd both be seventeen.

He'd write Sirius right away to get him back here. Sirius would have loads of ideas for next summer's non-stop party palace with babes, quidditch, food, drink and Evans. Yes, James was going to spend all this year getting Lily Evans. Maybe it was a good thing he wasn't playing Quidditch now, he'd have that much more time to devote to wooing the woman he loved. Wouldn't it be great if they had every class together, and then James could carry her books and walk her to meals, and then they could take strolls around the lake. Girls liked that kind of stuff.

After he wrote Sirius, James was also going to invite Remus and Peter round. Maybe they could all go down to King's Cross together too. Oh yeah, sixth year was going to be the best year yet!

************************

Once their Potions ingredients were finally here, Lily and Severus went over to Spinner's End to brew. Since they had been potions' partners for five years, the only problem was the inappropriate work area, but Severus didn't offer to use the kitchen, so Lily kept her thoughts to herself.

After they got the potion simmering at the right temperature, there was a two-hour wait before they needed to touch it again. Severus cast a protective shield over it out of habit.

They sat side by side on Severus' bed, and Lily asked, "Can I see your palm, Sev? I saw a couple things in your forecast that may be reflected there?"

"Like what, my death?" he replied while surrendering his right hand.

"Exactly, that's why I want to check your hand for the Grim, lame-o."

Lily got down to concentrating and taking notes. Severus couldn't take notes for her obviously, since he's right-handed, and she needed to look at his wand hand. Alright then, his fingers are longer than his palm, which is rectangular, rather than square or rounded. There was a scar on the underside of his pinky and that finger was bowed outwards in the middle, so unless he was pressing his fingers firmly together, would form a gap. And all this crap about his pinky is not relevant, she thought as she studied the lines, t's, h's and x's on his palm. As she held his hand in one of hers and traced his heart line while comparing the line to diagrams in her book, Lily noticed that Severus had brought the right side of his face to rest against hers. He was also looking at his hand. There was no actual interruption as Lily continued studying his palm, and taking notes.

Satisfied that she had explored the underside of his hand thoroughly, she capped her ink and closed her book. They still had over an hour left, so Lily turned his hand over and studied the back of it. A couple nicks, scratches, little scars that may fade in time, some short black hair and no freckles formed the landscape. She then turned it on its side and cradled it between hers. Sensing no resistance, Lily turned her face to the left, leaned over, kissed Severus slowly and continued moving her lips against his until she was thoroughly satisfied. Even more so because his hand remained calmly between hers.

"Can I rub your feet again?" Lily asked, already kicking off her sandals.

Severus looked uncomfortable, but then answered, "If you really want to."

"I do."

As soon as he had his feet bare, Lily insisted, "Lay down like last time." As she ran her hand along the back of his shirt suggestively, she felt a small shiver go through him, but he did comply with her request, sliding till his back was parallel to the wall.

He then sat back up and cast a second timer charm with an audible alarm to sound when there were two minutes to go. When he laid back down, Severus took a deep breath.

"Sev," Lily said, reaching out to touch his cheek, stroking slowly downward to his chin, "say something."

"About what?"

"Sometimes I feel you just do things because I tell you."

"Shouldn't I?"

"Stop answering my questions with questions."

"Alright."

Lily pouted at his silence, and slid her hand over his throat, up his shoulder, and then down his arm to hold his hand. "You like me to hold your hand?" she asked.

"Yes."

Lily smiled and then slid her foot into his. "How about this?"

There was a moment's hesitation before he answered, "Yes."

"Is something wrong? I studied your feet the other day when you took a nap. I'm not scared of them."

"No, it's .. just that I don't want to step on something. Shoes protect my feet."

"You don't sleep with shoes on."

"Sometimes. Depends."

"Why?"

"In case I need to get up in a hurry."

Lily decided to ignore Sev's crazy talk about wearing shoes to bed. She shifted to roll slightly on her back, noticing a browned water stain on the ceiling, and asked, "Where do you want to touch me?"

"I like holding your hand."

"And?"

Severus stayed silent.

"Please tell me. I'll tell you I like rubbing my feet against yours. And I like moving my lips against yours."

"That's … fine."

"Sev, you aren't telling me."

"What … whatever makes you happy, Lily."

Exasperated, Lily asked, "If I wanted to put my hand under your shirt, you'd let me now?" while putting her free hand on the front hem of his jumper, and pulling the stretched item up to the top of his trousers.

He didn't stop her, but she felt one of his legs twitch. "If you must," Severus answered with a sigh and closed his eyes.

"What's wrong? I saw … I saw you in June."

With an audible swallow, Severus kept his eyes closed and replied, "I know," as he remembered the worst day of his miserable life so far. He knew he was worthless, but to be treated as entertainment and then have no punishment meted out. Hogwart's was not the refuge he had dreamed about. It was far easier to understand his father, then the tormentors at school. They were supposed to be better people.

Lily didn't lift his shirt any further, but slid her hand under it, while still holding his hand and said, "I wouldn't hurt you, Sev."

His free hand joined the other one holding Lily's hand between them.

Lily wasn't actually in contact with the skin of his stomach, unless one counted the hole she could feel in his undershirt. Cautiously, she probed it with her finger. Quite warm, though she didn't think that a surprise considering Sev kept so covered even in summer.

"Are you ticklish?"

"Not sure."

"I'll save that for another day. When we aren't brewing a potion … and I can spend all day exploring where you are ticklish, Sev." She kissed him, and his eyes reopened. Strange, most people closed their eyes while kissing, but he opened his.

"Are you mad at me?" she asked.

"Why?"

"Because I'm molesting you," she said as she wiggled her finger deeper into his undershirt.

He sighed at Lily's attempt at levity.

She ignored that because she had found his belly button. Behaving life a niffler, Lily removed her hand from his and pulled his undershirt out of his trousers and slid down to look at it better.

Why bother, Lily was going to do as she pleased, Severus thought. Resisting only got her angry, sullen, and then she'd say she didn't want to see him anymore. He'd rather endure this, than be without Lily.

************************

Peter had to stay home and redo his assignments. His parents had checked them over like he was a first year. It was so embarrassing! He wrote James that he wouldn't be able to come till two days before they left of King's Cross because his gran was sick, maybe dying.

Remus decided to go immediately to James', but he would return home after a week to spend more time with his parents. They had been looking forward to taking their little Remus to King's Cross Station. He didn't want to disappoint them, and once he was there, he'd have plenty of time to catch up with James, Sirius and Peter.

Sirius packed up his room completely, danced down the stairs, jumped up and clicked his heels together, went into the kitchen and slapped Kreacher hard in the back of the head, grabbed some floo powder, and waved goodbye to Grimmauld Place as he stepped into the green flames.

************************

With more than two weeks of vacation left, Lily's Divination assignment was complete with color coded charts. She wanted to review Severus' with him. Ill omens were better faced with foreknowledge, even with all his kidding about the Grim.

Mrs. Evans gave Lily another letter from Mary. Yesterday's was from Helen. This train trip was turning into a nuisance. What to wear was only the beginning.

Severus received a fancy, light green envelope with his name in archaic calligraphy. Stupid posh Slytherins he thought as he opened it to read _'__**You Stink!**__' _That was the entire message, even when he held it up to the light.

"What was that?" Lily asked.

"Huh?"

"Did you feel something?"

Severus sniffed the air around him. Was it a jinx to make him smell bad? Would he be able to smell it, if he were the victim? What would be the point, if he couldn't smell it?

"I think I got some jinxed mail."

"Great! After breakfast, let's head over to your house and we'll pick that parchment apart fiber by fiber. And, you can show me the charm you used for that monkey note. I have some ideas to improve it."

"Of course."

************************

The note self-destructed as soon as they cast the first detect spell on it. Undeterred, Lily started casting detects on Severus. He appeared well, suffering no ill effects and nothing was turning up, even after he looked up more spells.

"Maybe this is related to what I forecast in your horoscope. You are going to be very ill in September, Sev."

"Ill? At Hogwart's? Pomfrey wouldn't let me lay around dirtying her linens."

"Oh come on, Madame Pomfrey is quite nice to all the patients I've brought her."

His only reply was a sigh. Of course, it must be him, not her.

"Don't worry, you'll survive to be in a very dangerous situation in November."

"Will that be the end of me then?"

"No, but you still need to be careful. Forecasting the future can always change so don't do anything foolish. Especially since something wonderful and life-changing will happen to you in February."

"I already knew that."

"Oh?"

"We'll both be seventeen, and can get married."

"Sev!"

"You don't think in between illness and mortal peril, we won't have time for a date in Hogsmeade?"

"Getting married is expensive."

"It's five galleons for the license."

The fact that Severus knew how much a license was, worried Lily. "No. I need to concentrate on school."

Severus frowned. To continue living without Lily? If she wasn't his, then … what? Considering his disbelief in dreams and hopes, this did not bode well. Thoughtfully, he suggested, "Perhaps I'll be so injured in November, that dying in February would be an improvement."

************************

Just who did Abraxas Malfoy think he was? demanded Orion Black to himself. To turn down the honor of joining the Dark Lord? Fool. But he was an influential fool. If Malfoy did not join, then others would take notice.

Abraxas' boy, Lucius, would be easy pickings once he inherited.

Where's that book? Searching for it, Orion got disgusted. Sirius was sloppy and moved everything around in here.

"Kreacher!" he yelled.

With a pop, the ugly house elf appeared. "Yes, Master Orion?"

Orion waved his hand towards the shelves, "Straighten these, and bring me Dismal Diseases for the Unworthy."

That old fool Abraxas would suffer for weeks before he died of one of the worst case of dragonpox in recorded history. He snorted, a Malfoy dying of dragonpox, scratching himself like a lowly, knuckle-dragging muggle.

AN: for a lark, I plugged in Jan 9th 1960 into one of those free astrology chart web sites. LOL

Rising Sign is in 12 Degrees Scorpio  
You tend to be quiet, reserved, secretive and, at times, quite difficult to understand. Others notice your deep emotions and feelings and wonder how to draw you out. Stubborn and tough, you fight for any position you believe in. You are very resourceful and formidable when you become angered or upset about something. You enjoy living life at the cutting edge -- for you life must be experienced intensely and totally. Quite courageous, you are willing to take calculated risks. Easily hurt by others, you often strike back with bitter sarcasm. Sensitive and curious, you are concerned with the deeper mysteries of human psychology. Once you have become interested in any subject, you pursue it with total fanaticism.


	20. Chapter 20 Worse than Freak

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

AN: I raised the story rating to M. There are items which are above young teen banter and trouble making.

Chapter 20 Worse than Freak

Lily was annoyed. Severus was sulking, and she was the one getting punished. Bad enough Petunia was taking the time to hang around her whenever she left her bedroom to imitate the Cheshire Cat.

Her nosy mother wouldn't believe that after spending all summer together, they just needed some alone time. They'd see each other soon enough at school. No, oh no, she had to give Lily talks about anything that could possibly be wrong – yes, the woman that had warned her about one thing leading to another was now worried that Severus Snape stopped being her shadow. Lily felt just a shred of guilt about her mother speculating that he could be hurt or not have anything to eat. The rest, well the rest was just a load of rubbish. She knew Sev had a temper and could say some pretty nasty things, but if he said something to Lily in a moment of anger, it didn't mean that Lily wouldn't be his friend anymore. How could her mother think she was so shallow?

After a week of not seeing him, Lily couldn't take it anymore. It was for her mother's sake that she'd sort this out, she couldn't stand to see her worry. The reason was definitely not because Lily didn't like kissing her hand or hugging her pillow, and wanted Sev back. Rather curl up with the giant squid first.

Spinner's End at daybreak was like any other time of day, except the shadows were deeper, and the dawning sunlight did not herald a new beginning, rather the promise that this is as good as it gets so stop wasting time daydreaming because if one doesn't, one won't survive to see nightfall.

Lily's plan to wait and watch for Severus was interrupted by some disreputable looking fellow who hissed, "How much?"

Seeing no one else around, Lily replied, "I'm not selling anything."

As he shambled closer, Lily got a nose full of a foul mixture of sweat, urine and alcohol. She didn't want to look him in the face because one glance was enough to convince her that Argus Filch could look a whole lot worse. It was hard to ignore the way he was eying her though. "Freebie then?" he asked suggestively.

"No," Lily replied indignantly, ready to hex him if he lurched any closer.

With a leer, he leaned against a wall and casually recommended, "You might like what you see," as he opened the front of his trousers.

With a squeak, Lily went running over to the Snapes' front door which was on the sunny side of the street. Turning to look back, she was relieved that the rotter hadn't followed her. He was still in the same spot in the shadows, looking straight at her, and doing something with his hands in front of his waist.

Ignoring the show across the road, Lily gave Severus' door a quick study. Sev just stroked and said something to it, but there was a lock. His parents had to be more reasonable than some lunatic on the street, she rationalized as she whispered _Alohamora. _She tried it, but it was still locked.

There was a loud cry of "Oh yeah" from across the street, followed by a string of words that were not used in polite company. Not done with harassing her yet, the ruined man approached and shuffled just into the sunlight, while holding his trousers up, rather than fastening them. He cackled, "I got a second go in me, girlie," then licked the flecks of spit off his cracked lips in a lewd manner.

At this point, Lily didn't care if she had to face a hungover Tobias Snape who was interrupted while giving his wife the 'hard one'. She pounded on the door for all she was worth … and heard barely anything. It would have been louder if she slapped a concrete block. With a quick glance backward to make sure her tormentor was keeping his distance, Lily looked at the door again. It was as she thought, no knocker or doorbell. The Snapes obviously did not care if someone was at their door.

Ready to defend herself later for attacking a muggle, Lily turned to glare at the pervert, standing up straight and throwing her shoulders back to show she wasn't afraid.

He laughed at her, and said, "Later then. Just whistle and I'll come take care of ya."

Lily did not take her eyes off him as he retreated slowly back into the shadows and then out of sight.

Reconsidering her plan, Lily decided waiting across the street in the shadows was not a good idea. Severus would not be able to see her here on the front doorstep from his window if she stayed close to his house. All she had to do was cross her fingers that one of his parents wouldn't be the first one to open the door and trip over her.

She tried to act nonchalant as some denizens of Spinner's End crawled out of their lairs. Most of the activity was children running to do errands, including some carrying buckets. Some were bold enough to stare at her, but Lily pretended it was perfectly natural for her to be lurking on the doorstep of this house.

As the ill-dressed urchins returned, moving more slowly with their burdens, they openly stopped to take a break and give her a good looking at. Appearing not to be intimidated, Lily crossed her arms over her chest and stared back at them.

After some whispers, one of the smaller dirty boys asked, "Got any food?"

"No, I'm sorry. I don't," Lily politely replied.

A bigger one with a sly look to him, then asked with a grin, "How about money?"

"No," Lily answered in a decidedly less friendly tone.

"Maybe we should check your pockets to be sure," he said as the children surged towards her.

One of them giggled, and said, "My hands are smaller to fit into those tight shorts."

Lily was shocked. These children couldn't be older than first years. Hexing them was going to be more incriminating than blasting that dirty old man. She was going to be expelled.

She was overcome with panic as she suddenly fell backwards into the Snapes' house. Severus snarling, "What?" was enough to scatter the poor frightened tykes.

Rather than asking more complex questions, he only looked down at her, still where she had fallen on her bum, and asked in a reasonable tone of voice, "Well?"

Frowning as she looked up at him, Lily considered that her mother might be satisfied that she had seen Severus alive and somewhat well. He was already dressed in trousers with braces, undershirt, and shoes, but could not be clearly seen in the shadowy interior of the house.

Unprepared to offer an explanation from the floor, Lily uttered, "Uh ..." while making an attempt to get up.

Sev offered her his hand and gave her a helping tug. He muttered, "It's early."

"Yes."

"I just got up," he explained as he moved outside where Lily could see that Severus' hair looked more of a mess than it usually was.

She followed and he closed the door, then moved to the side of the house and walked in the direction of the river. Lily took a couple quick steps to catch up with him, and reached for his hand.

He shrugged and kept her from taking his hand, explaining, "I haven't washed or anything yet."

After the morning she had so far, Lily needed a good washing too. "My mum noticed you haven't come round this week."

"Hmm," was his only reply as he turned away from the filthy, trash-strewn river to go through an opening in the dilapidated wood fence behind his house.

"She worries about you, Sev. … I do too."

"Are you following me, Lily?"

Lily looked around the garden that really wasn't. It was bare earth with weeds. She looked at the back of the house, and really had no idea why he walked all the way around it. She shrugged, but Severus was being a git and had turned his back to her. "Why not?" she asked.

He whirled to look her in the eye. Seeing she seemed serious, he sighed deeply, waved his hand vaguely, and asked, "What do you want ... kissing, touching, now you want to watch me pee."

Lily's mouth dropped open and the gasp that should have emerged died as she realized that Severus' question was rhetorical, he was already preparing to do what she never asked him to show her. Although he used both hands to keep _that bit_ covered, Lily blushed and forgot to close her mouth.

When he seemed to be finishing, she snapped out of it and looked up. Severus had been watching her watch him. She refused to look back down as he covered up.

He continued to stare at her, letting it sink into her mind how sick this was, and she followed him back here, knowing, well not knowing, but she should have known … and she blurted out, "You don't shave?"

A very slow blink was given, before he explained, "It's a charm that lasts a while."

"You're going to have to teach me that one, Sev."

He looked pained, gave his head a slight shake to throw his hair over his eyes and left the backyard.

Lily followed. She did enough strange stuff that he forgot, or at least had the decency never to bring up, could she be forgiven? Sometimes it was good to have a friend who didn't talk about much than schoolwork. If it was Helen or Mary, they'd be 'Remember the time Lily ….' This morning was definitely not going to be in any letters to them.

Lost in thought, Lily plowed right into the back of Severus who had stopped short of the front door, and muttered, "Sir," while looking at his feet.

"What's this?" Tobias Snape growled.

With a jerk of his head towards Lily, Severus explained, "She needs to borrow a book to finish her homework."

Lily assumed an innocent and hopeful look while looking at the man who had been pointed out to her, usually by Petunia, over the years. This was the closest she had ever gotten to Mr. Snape. He was giving her a piercing, cold stare. It was unlike the look that the other citizens of Spinner's End gave her this morning. His blue eyes dissected her, noting the wand that did not fit in hidden in her pocket, but finding nothing else of value.

"Well, get it, you good-for-naught, worthless, shiftless sack of shit."

She had seen Severus move fast when dueling, and this was just as quick as he somehow slid past his father who was taking up most of the entire doorway, without touching him in the slightest. Lily took a step forward to follow, but a finger was jabbed in her direction, "You stay here."

"Yes, sir," Lily replied, trying to keep things on the right track. She added, "Thank you for letting me borrow the book, Mr. Snape."

Obviously not swayed by good manners, he merely grunted in response. Mr. Snape was dressed similar to Severus, except his clothes fit, and may have less than ten years of wear on them. Even though he had already evaluated Lily, he continued to stare at her.

Severus returned, slid through the door, and thrust a book at Lily. It was their 2nd year Defense text. As meaningless as the instructor that year.

"Thank you, Severus. Ah, good day. And good day to you, Mr. Snape," Lily attempted to sway him with a smile.

She thought it worked because he gruffly replied, "Good morning" in response, but then immediately followed it by grabbing Sev by the upper arm, and pulled him into the house. "Get the fuck in here ..." and the door slammed closed. She heard nothing from inside, even though Mr. Snape was speaking very loudly when the door shut.

This was wrong. Lily dropped the Defense text, and clenched her hands into fists. After a full minute, Lily took a deep breath. She didn't actually expect that bullying coward to come right back out the front door, ready to be hexed to within an inch of his contemptible life? Picking up the book, she stepped back further to look up at Severus' window. She grew nervous, not seeing him, and now afraid that there will be more trouble if one of his parents saw her standing outside. Not sure of what to do, she headed home trying to think rationally of a solution.

************************

Everything was so pleasant at the Potters. They even allowed sunlight into their home. What a difference that made. Sirius could picture a place just like this for himself when he got older and was looking to settle down, maybe when he started pushing a hundred.

Sirius was full of excellent ideas for him and James for next summer. James' idea about renting a vacation cottage was jolly good. They'd be seventeen, and Remus and Peter would be seventeen, and well, there were lots of babes seventeen and older that didn't need their parents' permission to Party!

It turned out that James' infatuation with Evans was worse than Sirius originally thought, but hopefully that would all be sorted out before Snivelly got his greasy nose back to Hogwart's. Crap, Sirius was getting itchy just thinking about it. He hoped he hadn't caught fleas while running around in his animagus form.

Oh, double crap, he had that Dark Arts book in his packed things. This book was pretty bad overall. Dragonpox was the tamest thing in it by a long shot. Burn it? Knowing the rest of the Black family, they wouldn't be giving anyone pox, they'd be … eeeewwweee, turning somebody inside out … double ick, stretching their eyeballs out of their sockets to look where the sun don't shine … this settles it, Sirius would never defile another bloke's magic wand like this. This book is pure evil! Burn it!

************************

Mrs. Evans was not happy with Lily heading over to Spinner's End alone. The news that Severus was fine when she saw him calmed her down, but did nothing for Lily since she didn't know how he was now.

At dinner, Lily was still self-absorbed and missed that her father would not be going to London with them due to a work commitment. Her mother mentioning Severus caught her attention, and before she knew what was going on, Petunia was on a tirade speaking too loudly for the dinner table, declaring, "That freak is not a member of this family. He will not ruin my enjoyment of _having_ to go to London to see Lily off. He can hitchhike there for all I care."

Lily was mad. Petunia didn't _have_ to go anywhere. She just liked someone paying her way to London, and then if she pouted enough, her parents took her shopping at some very nice shops there. She came home with bags of clothes and other stuff she didn't need at least twice a year, if she didn't go down for Christmas and Easter too.

"We are already paying for the room, Petunia. Can just order up a rollaway, and then Lily won't have to worry about her friend getting his school things and making the train all in one morning. You can do as you like the afternoon before while we are at their shops, then after they catch the train, it'll just be us two girls."

Petunia's eyes grew speculative, 'two girls' was code for shopping spree at very nice places. However, she had to draw the line somewhere with what she was willing to put up with. "I just would not be comfortable with that nasty boy sleeping in the same room as me," she protested with a degree of shyness, changing her tactics.

"Your mother will be in the same room, Petunia."

"He is here an awful lot, dear. I don't see how sleeping or being awake makes much difference."

Petunia could not believe how naïve her mother was sounding. She just may have to just stand up for what she felt was right and not go. They couldn't choose some freak from Spinner's End over their lovely and dutiful daughter. Then they would uninvite him, and after Lily got on that freak train of hers, her mum could make it up to her.

************************

Severus was sitting on the Evans' back porch stairs the next morning. Once Mrs. Evans heard Lily moving around her bedroom, she offered Severus tea and invited him into the kitchen. His hair was curtaining his face, and she longed to take a pair of scissors to it. He didn't bother pushing it back while he slowly ate porridge either.

Lily was immensely relieved to see her friend back at his seat in the kitchen. Since The Daily Prophet was once again just filled with drivel, she used her letter from Helen to try to engage him in conversation. "I think my roommates are making a bit more out of this train trip then they normally do. I guess waiting over a month got them all worked up."

"That's fine. I'm sure Wilkes and Rosier have used all theirs to consider the strategy of every possibility."

"So they aren't involved in a furious onslaught of letters worried about what to wear?"

"With me?" he muttered sarcastically more to the porridge than Lily.

"Would it be inappropriate for either green or red to be worn?"

He shrugged, "Doesn't matter."

Seeing little choice but to focus on her food so she could question Severus without her mother around, Lily dug in.

Mrs. Evans broached the subject about London. "Severus, Lily and I were going to travel to London a day early to pick up the last of her school supplies before she boarded the train. Would you like to join us? We'd be staying overnight in a hotel, and already have it booked."

Not displaying any enthusiasm, or at least what could be discerned while he continued to stare downwards with his hair covering his face, "Sounds like you'll have a lonely time on the way back, after we're gone, Mrs. Evans."

"Petunia may change her mind."

"If she's not going because I may be there, then I really should decline."

Lily frowned. Petunia could be such a pain in the bum. Severus was right, it would be unfair for her mother to give up her company back home for his sake. However, he was a sneaky Slytherin, why would he care, unless he was trying to avoid being with them in Diagon Alley. That was their sole magical destination, other than King's Cross.

In more of a hurry now to interrogate Severus, Lily tried to stuff a half-slice of toast into her mouth whole. She received a huff and stern glare from her mother for eating … like a Gryffindor.

As soon as she finished, Lily asked her friend to join her upstairs. Rather than immediately doing as she asked, Severus replied, "Must I? I should go home and work more on my Arithmancy."

"What?"

"I don't want to be copying it out clean on the train."

"Just for a bit, Sev," she said as she went over to the counter to join him and add, "please."

He tilted his head to meet Lily's eyes, before getting up to follow her.

After closing the door over, Lily turned to find Severus with his arms over his chest, and still covering his face with his hair.

She adopted a similar pose, and he muttered, "What?"

"Why did you even bother coming today, if you're going to be like this?"

"You made it sound like your mother wanted to see me."

Lily gave an exasperated sigh, and said, "What about me?"

"I think you should make yourself clearer, Lily."

"Clearer?"

"Yes."

Lily thought about that a moment. Obviously there was miscommunication. "Right. You need to answer some of my questions then?"

He shrugged, then responded with, "Real questions or about cleverly shaped notes, shaving charms and when I last brushed my teeth?"

"Ow," commented Lily.

"At school, you mostly ignore me outside Potions or if we can get a table together in the library, if your girlfriends aren't with you. In the summer, we are with each other almost every day, except when your family goes on vacation, or you get mad at me and tell me to go away. Are you also angry at me when we're at school?"

"Well, you're in Slytherin."

"And what does that mean to you? I don't think it bad that you are in Gryffindor, just that you might react before thinking. You are still a good person, and are brave enough to admit when you make a mistake."

Lily looked at Severus. He thought about all this stuff? "Well, Slytherins might cheat to win."

"Do you feel I cheat you? For example, have I ever tried to take credit for anything we do as a team in Potions? Or do I copy off your tests?"

"No. Prof. Slughorn actually does the opposite and gives me credit for something you did. But it's not like I encourage his misconception. He just insists it must be me."

"I know. It's because you are good-looking, well-mannered, and he expects great things from you. He's very biased."

Rather than talking about Slughorn when Severus was so clearly prejudiced against him, Lily answered, "So to answer your question … there's nothing wrong with you being in Slytherin, Sev. I hope this train trip turns out well, and I won't have to be the only brave member of Gryffindor house willing to talk civilly to a Slytherin."

"Why have you wanted to do different things with me this summer?"

A lot of silly answers came to Lily's mind, and a couple cruel ones. What was the true one? "I have feelings for you, Sev. You are my best friend, and have been for years. I am certain of that kind of love. I do not know the extent of how else I love you yet."

"For me, Lily, it's always been you. No one but you."

"We're sixteen. Things are likely to change."

"Why do they need to?"

"So much is beyond our control."

"Are you willing to let unknown factors beyond our control rule your life?"

Lily did not like getting into verbal arguments about vague concepts with Severus. She was smart and clever, but it always seemed like he gave everything thorough thought way in advance of debating it. "I don't want to feel rushed into a decision, Sev."

"I don't understand if you are talking about what I originally asked. You kissed me, but you were rushed into that?"

"No. I know I kissed you. I also really embraced you, and yesterday out back was a misunderstanding. I missed you so much that I just followed you."

He smirked, then asked, "Why did you watch then?"

"Shock? I'm sure you could have showed me a lot more than I saw. Thank you, for being considerate."

Severus had shifted his stance while talking to her and in addition to his smirk, his hair had slid away from his face so she could see his eyes.

"So back to my question. You think of me as your best friend, who you want to hold hands with, kiss, embrace and rub your feet against?"

"Now you understand," Lily responded, giving him a big smile and stepping forward to close the distance between them.

His hands came up to ward her off, and he took a step back. "No, I can't right now."

"Why not?" Lily asked, still closing in.

He twitched and said, "I'll be better next week."

"Are you … ?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"How am I supposed to be 'clear', if you won't tell me things?"

Severus gave a deep sigh. "There's nothing you can do about it right now. At the end of vacation, I'll take care of it."

Now that Lily was right in front of him, she saw a small bruise below his temple, almost covered by his hair. Slowly she put her finger up, and he mentioned, "Poking makes it hurt."

Her finger stopped, but she didn't put it down. "Where else?"

"Could you just leave it alone?" he asked, and then leaned closer and kissed her finger lightly.

"It's wrong," Lily explained.

"Many things are wrong. I can endure this, Lily. Besides, I don't want you playing nurse and mollycoddling me," he said while appearing that such a thing would cause him more pain than any injury he had.

"If you come with us to London, you can heal it sooner?"

"I wouldn't want to come between you and Petunia. If you have a chance of reconciling, wouldn't it be worth it?"

"We won't reconcile over shopping. I'm not interested in dressing that nice."

"Ah, I see. So you are starting to share my keen fashion sense then?"

Lily looked at Sev's jumper, which looked pretty much like the one she borrowed when it rained, and simply replied, "No."

"If Petunia doesn't change her mind, then I'll go along with you and your mother. Just leave me out of it till the last minute. I can get there on my own."

"Do you have train fare?"

"Yes, Lily."

"Do you really have Arithmancy to work on?"

"Yes. Why would I lie about Arithmancy? It's not like it's Divination and be just made up with no supporting information," he chuckled.

"Well, we'll see soon enough. Feeling warm yet?" Lily asked while putting her hand against his forehead.

"No. Maybe the Marauders will make me sick up to help you out."

"They help no one out but themselves."

"Alright for me to go now?"

"I suppose. Could you please come back tomorrow?"

"I intend to."

************************

"Me's sorry, Master Orion. That book you's wants is nowhere's in the house," Kreacher said while repeatedly bowing so deeply that his forehead kept hitting the floor, while wringing his miserable useless fingers because he had failed the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black.

Annoyed, Orion Black aimed a kick at the worthless creature, and snarled, "You disgust me."

Kreacher popped out of sight with the intent of finding proper punishments to inflict on his no-account self in the kitchen.

Not letting his plan to humiliate Abraxas Malfoy and let him suffer long before an ignoble death, Orion stroked his chin thoughtfully as he scanned the spines of the foul books within the Black family library. Infecting the Malfoys with dragonpox would have been perfect, with that brainless brat Lucius worried about ruining his looks, it would have been easy for the Dark Lord to seduce the easily flattered boy into joining.

Come to think of it, Lucius was not even worthy of licking the blood of filthy muggles of his lord's boots. Walburga's brother, Cygnus, had a houseful of marriageable girls. If one of them married the Malfoy whelp, and he met with an accident after breeding with one of them, the Malfoy holdings and wealth would be a very pleasing acquisition. Once Orion's father, Arcturus, passed, he would be the head of house and in control of it all.

Pulling out a promising title, Orion mused how fortunate he was to have at least one son whom he could rely on to carry on the proud name and traditions of Black, and who would not shame them when he joined the Dark Lord.

************************

Lily had to face it. She had no inner Slytherin to channel, and it felt completely unnatural attempting to manipulate people. What she wanted couldn't be accomplished – she would have liked both her parents, Petunia and Severus with her. Losing her father's company to work, she concentrated on Petunia because she was the one making all the demands.

Playing dumb seemed to get Lily's foot in the door with Petunia. After all, it was Petunia that had been hanging around Lily to gloat when Severus stopped coming round for a bit, so Lily felt it fair she now return the favor, without the gloating part of course.

She dove headfirst into all Tunie's magazines with the latest fashions, life styles and everything that was 'in'. Petunia also loved celebrity gossip, but Lily was spared that. Her sister reluctantly warmed up to Lily's interest in the real world finally. Lily ferreted out Petunia's plans for this trip to London – a smart new hair style, and good quality (in Petunia speak, that's expensive named labels) peasant style clothing and some boots to go with those clothes. Lily resisted rolling her eyes at the indicated glossy pages of this 'peasant style' clothing. What had happened to bell bottoms? Petunia also took the time to bombast American-influenced clothing as unsuitable due to the yanks all living in California and wasting all their days surfing.

After all this immersion into Petunia's world, it only took one comment to get her sister thinking. Lily sighed and suggested in the most convincing attitude of hopelessness, "It seems like such a shame, that you will have to wait till at least December to get down to London to get quality, Tunie." Lily was playing on Petunia's fears that she'd be stuck having to buy clothing locally, perhaps from a discount store once these must-have fashions became commonplace.

"December?" snapped Petunia.

"Well, if Severus is tagging along with me, Tunie, I wouldn't want you to have to put up with that kind of hardship. It's much better to wait, and pop down to London with mum before Christmas when I come home from school."

"It's not like I'm taking _that_ into shops with me. Mum and I would be going to _proper_ places, not that claustrophobic alleyway filled with squawking animals and freaks."

Lily controlled herself, it wouldn't help matters to point out there was only one pet store, and not a very big one at that. "I just feel that you might be right, Tunie. You know how he shadows after me, so there's no way he's going to turn down mum's invitation," Lily explained, knowing Petunia had not heard Sev declined their mother's invitation because Mrs. Evans was the eternal optimist thinking that everything would sort itself out. "What if he stays up staring at me sleep all night?"

Petunia nodded. That sounded exactly what that nasty boy would do. How she wished their father was going. The thought of that freak in the same room as her mother and sister, even if her baby sister was a freak too, was blood-curdling. Petunia knew things, and she had seen _The Exorcist_ and that new movie _The Omen._ In fact, Petunia was the only one in the family strong enough to see that filth from Spinner's End for what he really was. She'd simply have to go with them, and if they somehow survived, there was shopping afterwards.

************************

At last, Peter could unwind and kick back at the Potters with his best friends, James Potter and Sirius Black. They'd be meeting Remus Lupin at King's Cross, and then Hogwart's would be theirs.

Sixth year was going to be their best year yet. No worries about OWLs and the NEWTs. They could worry about the important stuff – girls, quidditch, parties and girls.

James' plan for renting a summer cottage next year was brilliant! Peter was already thinking about the girls he'd invite – Mary and Helen from their year, that Hufflepuff Seeker, there was that cute Ravenclaw chaser, that girl from Transfiguration that he had caught looking at him …

************************

Who's nose was longer than a telephone wire now? Severus thought, as he ignored Petunia's glare at him on the train. He hadn't believed Lily when Petunia said it was alright for him to come too, but her older sister had been even more hostile today than usual. Had her parents set a spending limit?

Lily was keeping a modest distance between them, but still talked to him about unimportant things. She already knew that he had healed up any injuries he still had before he left Spinner's End with his shrunken possessions and the tarnished key to his mother's old mostly-empty Gringott's vault. The pittance that had been in it originally had to last him through seven years of school. If mother hadn't kept all her old schoolbooks, he would had to resort to stealing them starting about third year. There had to be some way, legally, of making some money without demeaning himself. At sixteen, he didn't expect a decent wage, but with Lily insisting on Hogsmeade dates, any amount would be welcome.

Since he wasn't being good company, with Petunia's look starting to give him a headache, Lily changed to talking to her sister and mother about their expected destinations tomorrow, once they were done at King's Cross.

As his head hurt more as they neared London, Severus considered that maybe he stayed up too late doing a few last Arithmancy equations to add to his project. He closed his eyes to give them some rest, and ended up taking an unintended short nap. They woke him when the train stopped, but Petunia was giving him some odd looks. He felt better, that was the important thing.

The hotel was not far from the station by taxi. He didn't understand the transaction that Mrs. Evans was making at the front desk. Seemed overcomplicated, even for muggles. The obtaining of a hotel room ritual had completed at the front desk, and now some uniformed muggle was going to 'show' them the room. With big room numbers engraved onto the keys, Severus really thought guidance unnecessary because once they got out of the creaking elevator, the rooms were in numerical order, with the first number matching the floor number.

It seemed part of the 'showing' was for the guests to compliment the guide on the room, open the curtains and then make favorable remarks about the view from the window. Having no other hotel rooms to compare this too, Severus just stood aside and let the others handle it. The room had two big beds, another small bed with wheels (Mrs. Evans called it a rollaway?), a large wooden desk with telephone with a couple books and magazines on it, a few chairs, a large triple dresser, and then the guide opened the wooden cabinet to show a big telly. He turned as the ladies were saying something about the bathroom, and suddenly it sounded like someone had cast _muffliato_, when their conversation became just low buzzing in his ears. His normal hearing was restored once he moved into their grouping as they were seeing the guide out of the room.

Severus must have missed the planning part of the trip, other than Petunia was going shopping once Lily and him weren't around to embarrass her in some way. The three of them sat down, and seemed to be getting comfortable. Unpacking some articles for the bath, putting some clothes in drawers, Petunia flipped through one of the magazines, Lily turned on the telly looking at all the channels, and Mrs. Evans found items to straighten, even if this wasn't her home and was perfectly tidy when they walked in.

Petunia found something in her magazine and pointed it out to the other two. A place she wanted to eat lunch. She looked at Severus, and added, "Do you need to look like a destitute hippie?"

"I was going more for the overgrown, grubby, street urchin look. What would you suggest?"

Petunia shook her head, but Lily took out her wand and gave his jumper a makeover. It was now dark green, fit, and had no holes.

Severus just shrugged, but Petunia said, "Still looks like a dustman."

Mrs. Evans ignored her eldest daughter, and said, "Right. Let's be off."

On the way down in the elevator, Severus felt a bit dizzy like he unwillingly passed through a repelling charm of some sort. Who would put one in an elevator shaft? If the car was in motion, the passengers couldn't turn back around.

The place Petunia had found in the magazine was within walking distance, and Severus detected no other spells on the way over there. After being seated, he felt the other three glancing at him as he studied the menu. Did they think he didn't know what to do? That must be the case he thought as they started comparing the merits of the different offerings verbally amongst themselves. Most of what they talked about was pure cack that could be the filthiest, disease-ridden parts of an animal, and no guarantees that it's from the animal listed on the menu anyway. Might as well order a deep fried rat on a stick, but then that would remove the air of mystery about the meal, wouldn't it?

The server looked to Severus first, which was not proper. He ordered Glamorgan sausage and water. His earlier headache gave a little pulse as he listened to the girls ordering their meals. In an effort to stop Petunia's glare at him, he slid some money to Mrs. Evans, next to him, to cover his order.

Rather than coming with them to the Leaky Cauldron to enter Diagon Alley, Petunia was going to window shop through some district known for some sort of clothing, Severus really didn't care so just stopped listening. While he was trying to assess if he should take his last headache draft in his shrunken school trunk, he saw a large group of colorful people outside the restaurant window, with hairstyles clearly chosen to attract attention. Now that looked painful – safety pins, in their eyebrows, noses, ears and one girl with it fastened through the side of her mouth? Severus' head wasn't hurting that much.

Mrs. Evans gave Petunia some words of advice, before Lily, Severus and her headed over to the Leaky Cauldron to enter Diagon Alley. Both the Evans and Severus needed to go to Gringott's. Since Severus would take longer to get money from a vault, then they would to exchange muggle money, Lily suggested her and her mum go buy owl supplies and meet at Madam Malkin's. Sev still needed to replace uniform items, and Lily was thinking about some casual robes, but wanted to look through the selection. All that fashion talk with Petunia had gotten her thinking.

Severus had gone with a goblin to the vault before via magic cart, but today they must have taken a different way. It hadn't been this twisty with sudden drops that left his stomach behind. With the headache, he could hardly calculate half the amount left in the vault, and got confused about the price of school robes. Since the goblin did not consider Severus Snape to be a good Gringott's customer, he was quite testy and insisted repeatedly he hurry up. Severus considered just turning around and barfing all over him to put him in his place, but who knew when the next magic cart would stop down here to pick him up.

Aggravated that he couldn't think, Severus just swept the lot into his purse. He turned, resisted kicking the goblin or grabbing its ears, and got back in the cart. Towards the end of the ride, Severus was sorely tempted to grab what little hair was on the top of the goblin's head and pull it out. He purposely chose to return them to the surface by some crazy corkscrew section of track. If Lily wasn't waiting for him, he'd happily start the next Goblin Rebellion right now. None of his money was in a vault anymore so he'd have nothing to lose.

He carefully made his way to the door out of Gringott's and stepped out into Diagon Alley. It was noisy, stank and the sun was shining too brightly for a proper British day. His cautious movements allowed Lily to arrive at Madam Malkin's before him. Severus just sat down in a chair to wait because Lily was asking questions about robes. Mrs. Evans was inspecting some items on a rack, and occasionally holding one up for Lily.

"What do you think, Sev?" Lily asked from right in front of him. He didn't even see come over.

"Huh?"

"Have you heard anything?"

"No."

She leaned closer, and asked, "Did something happen to you? You look flushed."

"The cart ride in Gringott's. I think I got a goblin that had some grudge against wizards."

"You don't feel hot," Lily said as she put her hand on his forehead. He didn't even feel well enough to mock that gesture.

"Stop that. If you don't see robes here you like, there's another place in Diagon Alley … Twill something and Tatting's. Some of the Slytherin girls swear it's the best."

"You expect me to take that as a recommendation?"

"No."

"Do you think I need dress robes?"

"For what?"

"For anything."

"If something comes up during the school year, there's that other shop in Hogsmeade. However, if they have robes here that are the same color as your eyes, you should get those."

"Green?"

"It's not Slytherin green."

"But I have red hair."

"You can always try them on first," he answered, getting tired of this whole conversation. If Lily didn't want his opinion, then why did she ask it?

"I suppose. Madam Malkin … Severus needs some school robes. How about I keep browsing while you help him?"

Now that his brain was further addled by mindless talk about robes that Lily didn't need, he pulled out his list to recall what he needed to procure here in order to reach the minimum requirements for Hogwart's uniforms. He was magically measured, his order filled, paid for and back in the chair, while Lily continued to fuss around.

Although it was a terrible position to keep an eye out for potential attacks, Severus found it very soothing to just lean forward with his elbows on his knees and just let his head hang forward with his eyes closed.

"Sev?" Lily asked softly when she approached him.

"Hmm?" was the reply, with no movement.

Feeling a little guilty about taking this opportunity when he was obviously feeling unwell, Lily did it anyway and flipped his hair away from the back of his neck. "Where else do you need to go?" she asked while just looking at the raised white line that she had felt there when she had been stroking his bare neck seemingly so long ago.

"More ink, quills, and some potions ingredients," he replied slowly raising his head, and hoping that they would really be leaving here and not going to the other robe shop. He thought he felt a bit better, but perhaps should lay down as soon as he could.

Not seeing any improvement in his appearance, Lily suggested, "How about we do potions ingredients first. We can always get quills and ink by owl or in Hogsmeade."

"Fine," he agreed weakly as he stood.

Lily had already told her mother that Severus was unwell, while he was sitting limp in the chair ignoring everything around him. Looking at Severus, Mrs. Evans asked, "Do you think some ice cream would help?"

He was barely able to glare in response. Ice cream? Must be a new cure all from the hand on the forehead school of medicine. He followed them along the street fuming a bit at what nonsense her children must have claimed for illnesses if they told her ice cream cured them. Spoiled rotten brats.

Reaching Slug and Jiggers, Lily indicated he should go first, so he just folded his list over and handed it across the counter with the ingredient list facing upwards. Something slimy in the barrel next to the till was rather foul, so he rested against the counter with his hand clamped over his nose and breathed through his mouth. The shopkeep was glacially slow and seemed lost among his own inventory. It was intolerable.

Something nudged his shoulder, and Severus opened his eyes. Lily said, "I have both our ingredients here," as she held up a bag, and nudged him again to urge him off the counter. "We should go back to the hotel so you can lay down."

Surprised at nodding off in the smelly store, Severus asked, "Do you have everything that you needed already?"

"Yes. I can get the rest by owl."

"I'm well enough if you need to go someplace else."

"Don't worry about it, Sev."

Getting back to the hotel seemed rather hazy to him, and this must be the first elevator they took up because there was no repelling charm this time. Once he was seated in the room, Mrs. Evans put both her hands on his face and was talking to him about taking a bath before laying down. Why? He just wanted to get some rest, then he'd feel fine. When she removed her hands, he was shaking his head but could hear the water running in the bath. Then Lily was saying something about shampoo. No. Lily didn't talk about his hair like that, she knew that they had no water in his house. Only essentials got washed every day. Maybe he was remembering something that nasty goblin said earlier about his hair.

Why was he thinking about the sadistic goblin when Lily was still talking to him? He'd have plenty of time later to revenge himself and start and end the next Goblin Rebellion and put it on his chocolate frog card. He certainly deserved a card more than Archibald Alderton. Paying attention to Lily now was more important than planning the blurb on the back of his chocolate frog card. He could work on that later. She had already gotten his trunk from him, and had enlarged it. Maybe putting away his new uniforms and potions ingredients? What was she looking for? Pajamas … ah yes, the real reason he couldn't be in Slytherin. That was Slughorn and the fellows' favorite nighttime uniform, flimsy silk or satin two-piece affairs, with embroidered, velvet dressing gowns, and soft house slippers that did little to protect feet from sharp or heavy, dropped objects. Lily wasn't going to find that sort of impracticality taking up room in his trunk.

Lily pulled Severus to his feet after she found something for him to wear to sleep, and led him into the bathroom. He must have been paying some attention to her and her mother because he was already pulling his jumper off before she left the room, and closed the door. He must have been kidding around when he mumbled something about a goblin and a chocolate frog card.

Mrs. Evans said, "If Severus isn't better tomorrow morning, maybe we should take him to hospital."

"He said it was from the bank. I've heard they got some sort of transport system underneath that's a cross between mine cars and a roller coaster. He should be well enough to put on the train for school because our nurse there can fix anything up." Lily knew there was a wizard hospital somewhere called St. Mungo's. She could go back to Diagon Alley and ask questions, but if it wasn't close to here, how would they get there? Was there an equivalent of a wizard ambulance? Lily's owl was home because of this overnight trip and stay in a muggle hotel, and the plan was that her mum would send her with a letter to Lily later this week.

Her mother tilted her head to listen, and both of them heard some water moving in the bathtub. Mrs. Evans then got busy with some straightening, even though there was nothing out of place since the last time she had tidied the room.

Lily put away Sev's new uniforms, and his portion of the bag of ingredients into his potions kit. While waiting, she considered if she should take anything out for him. Why did he pack his old red toothbrush with the tooth powder? Lily looked around his trunk, but the blue toothbrush and tube of toothpaste weren't in it. She did pull out his hair brush, which Lily had seen before, but uh … could use replacing.

The bathroom door opened. Severus seemed more lively than he did when he went in for a bath. He went right to his trunk, pulled out a folded cloth bag, and shoved his dirty laundry into it. Lily saw that he had removed her transfiguration from earlier and had his jumper back on over the long underwear bottoms and undershirt she had chosen for him to wear to bed. He was barefoot at least, instead of that nonsense he was talking about wearing shoes to bed. The long underwear only reached to mid-calf and was rather tight, as Lily's eyes traveled upwards, she suspected why Sev had put his overlarge jumper back on.

"I took out your toothbrush," Lily said.

Severus looked longingly at the rollaway bed. Lily added, "I can brush your hair while you brush your teeth so you can go to bed quicker."

He gave her a pained expression, but went back into the bathroom. Lily gave him his brush and powder, and he got to it. She started working on his hair, but decided it would be better if he sat on the commode and then it was much easier. It also gave her another chance to look at his nape, but the neck of this undershirt was just ragged, not stretched out of shape, so she didn't see anything more than she saw earlier.

Lily was pleased that he hadn't left the bathroom a mess. Tub drained, nothing left in it, floor dried and towel hung. One thing was certain, Severus could never fit in with the Gryffindors. Even the girls … well, let's just say it was obvious they were not raised in the Evans' household, except Lily.

Finished, Lily said, "I'll put your stuff away, Sev. Maybe you could just go lay down."

He just grunted. If it was up to him, he would have laid down as soon as they got back here.

Severus started snoring before Lily finished in his trunk. She studied him, and considered her father did snore louder, but that probably wouldn't matter to Petunia.

She looked over at her mum, and she was watching Severus sleep. Creeping quietly over to her mother, she whispered, "Did he just go to sleep?"

"Well, he twisted around a bit, then just passed right out. That's a good sign."

Was it? thought Lily. Trying to think back to her illnesses, she could only think of laying in bed awake and being bored when she was really sick. The other times were just kind of pretend sick, and she'd hop out of bed and do things once her mum left the room.

Could getting motion sick count for her Divination assignment? It was a bit of a stretch, since it was August 31st, and Lily had forecast a major illness.

Since it was a bit odd to Lily that her mum was watching Sev sleep, she clicked on the telly and kept the sound low. Lily looked over and it appeared that it didn't bother him in the slightest.

"Did you want this station, or is there something else on?"

"Whatever you want, dear."

"Were we going to wait for Petunia for dinner?"

"Yes, we should."

Lily did notice her mum looking at Severus even more, and then found her hovering over him when she came out of the bathroom. Did she expect him to do something unusually magical while he slept? If that was the case, wouldn't Lily do it too when she slept?

Joining her mum, she whispered, "Did he do something?"

"No, dear."

Lily wanted to shoo her mother away. What if he woke up and found the two of them staring down at him? Hex first, ask questions later. "He's jumpy, even when he's asleep."

"Of course."

Of course? What did her mother mean by that? Lily thought to herself as she flopped onto the bed in front of the tv. Probably just trying to act like she knows everything with the 'of course' and 'good sign'.

Finally, Petunia returned, using her own key to let herself in. Both Lily and her mother, put their fingers to their lips to silently signal her that quiet was requested. Petunia made a face at them, but did not burst out into chatter while she carried a couple bags into the room proper. She did see Severus asleep, and gave them a questioning look then asked quietly, "What happened to him?"

"Goblin made him sick," Lily explained. Petunia looked at her sister and didn't need to say that was no explanation at all.

"If you're hungry, dear, we three could still go out to dinner."

Petunia looked uncertain, but then figured it's not like they were leaving the freak alone in their house. She wasn't going to sit in a London hotel room, feasting on takeaway and watching telly all night.

Lily turned off the television set, and then wrote out a note in the unlikely event Severus woke up.

************************

Nothing appeared different when they returned from dinner. The room was dark, but once the curtains were drawn and a couple lamps turned on, Petunia took the time to quietly show her sister and mother her new acquisitions. She had already told them of her adventures over dinner.

Lily then turned the telly back on. This was really boring with Severus not available for conversation.

She tried to find something decent, but without knowing these programs, any long-running show had characters who she didn't know and couldn't understand their motivation. The sound of laughter broadcast with any show was annoying because Lily felt it should be left up to her whether something was funny or not. She ended up on a sort of variety show, but given the talent of the participants, it had to be some sort of joke, even though the people on the show providing commentary sounded very supportive. If Lily were there, she'd tell the truth – put your clothes back on, cats were never meant to do that, dinner plates are not for spinning atop sticks, a person your size should exercise but not on telly with a stack of hula hoops, why would you want to bend over so far that you could see your own backside?

Equally nettlesome was her mother and Petunia watching Severus more than the telly. If they liked anything Lily had scanned through earlier, they could have said something. Lily divided her time between watching her mother watching Severus, Petunia watching Severus, watching Severus herself to make sure he really wasn't doing something interesting, and the current divvy on the telly.

Lily had enough of watching all of this when Sev kicked the blanket off his foot while continuing to snore. She had already studied his feet, and there was nothing attractive about them. So why were her family looking at it? Displeased, she decided to get ready for bed, and grabbed her stuff, heading into the bathroom.

Petunia got her stuff together when Lily came out, and clarified, "I am sleeping in that bed," while pointing at the one further from Severus. Her sister wasn't surprised, and just went about stowing her stuff neatly, and reviewing what she'd wear tomorrow.

Her mother was not even pretending to watch whatever this was on the screen now, so Lily turned off the tv. Why bother, when it was clear that the most exciting thing in here was Sev, now that he was no longer in a motionless coma? He hadn't woken after close to six hours, but would occasionally jerk, tug or kick at the covers, after a discontented look seeped onto his face, and then return to snoring. It would be one thing if Lily was watching him because she was still working on unraveling her best friend, but it was rather off putting that her mum and Petunia were also observing him. Neither of them better go poking at him, Lily needed him rested and somewhat pleasant and mannerly on the train tomorrow for Helen and Mary. Not that Sev's roommates didn't know him, but Helen and Mary did not socialize with him, so his habitual rudeness and abrupt mannerisms might come to the forefront. Now that her roommates were willing to give her best friend who she kissed, an opportunity, in order to meet other gentlemen, this was important to Lily. Getting nervous, she went back to her things to look over what she thought was best to wear tomorrow.

While wallowing in indecision, Petunia came out of the bathroom and her mother went in. Petunia was tidying her things away, when she let out an awfully loud huff, muttered something that Lily thought might be 'pig' and 'rolled up socks' before shooting straight over to Severus. Lily was confused, she knew Severus didn't leave his dirty socks thrown about over there. Knowing Petunia, she waited impatiently for her to either hold up some disgusting evidence in a disdainful, yet triumphant, manner, or slink back to her corner.

Rather than going for whatever she saw on the floor, Petunia bent over Severus who was sprawled on his back again and with the blankets just covering his knees. Her sister's body was in the way, but it looked like she gave Sev a sharp prod in the stomach with her jabbing finger.

"Hey," Lily objected, but Petunia ignored her and bent over her friend, to closely looking at whatever she was touching with her hand.

Lily was on her way over to tell her sister to cut it out, when she suddenly stood up and straightened Severus' covers over him. When Lily got next to her, Petunia was tucking Sev in tight, like her mother had taught them to do when they played with baby dolls as girls.

"What are you doing?" she asked, confirming that her sister still hadn't woken Severus up with her strange behavior.

"Nothing," Petunia muttered.

Lily saw her sister's face was very red. "What were you doing?"

Rather than staying on the defensive, Petunia hissed at Lily, "As if you didn't know."

"Uh ..."

"Why didn't you say something, rather than letting me touch … freak …" Petunia's words became incoherent at the end, so Lily wasn't sure if she was being called freak, or Severus.

"Say something about what? You went over there. He didn't do anything 'cause he's sleeping," Lily explained in a lowered voice as she followed Petunia.

Her sister unexpectedly turned, she also kept her voice low, but it was dripping with venom as Petunia accusingly pointed her finger at Lily and angrily expounded, "Bad enough with you two being freaks, but to go panting and drooling after that Spinner's End filth. My _perfect_ sister turns out to be a shameless slut."

"What?" demanded Lily. What could be worse than being a freak, in her sister's book? Well, obviously being a slut, but what did that have to do with Severus?

Petunia adopted a haughty look as she stretched her neck to turn her nose in the air while simultaneously looking down it at Lily, smugly she replied, "Don't act like I wouldn't know what kind of wickedness turns good girls bad. He's got it by the lorry-load. You exult in how nasty and foul he is. You love sneaking off to that filthy shack and rolling around with him in squalor while he does depraved things to your body, and you begging for it the whole time, and pleading for him to take you to new depths of vileness."

Lily was struck speechless. Petunia's fabrication of this scenario between her and her best friend was so wrong. She was able to barely reply with, "We don't ..."

"Of course you deny it," she said in an almost agreeable tone. "Till you run home crying when you're up the duff with his awful bastard. Then our parents will know what kind of soiled piece of rubbish you really are," Petunia elaborated with a smile at the thought of being proven right after so long.

Trying to be reasonable, which was very hard, Lily took a deep breath, and then calmly said, "If you can share what led you to this conclusion, then perhaps we could come up with the truth."

Her sister laughed. "Considering your deception thus far, I'm sure you'd be able to maintain it, you bint."

Lily clenched her fists. This had gone far enough, and although Petunia was older and still a bit taller, she knew she could give her sister a good enough wallop to confine her to the house, rather than having to answer any awkward questions. As Lily pulled her right elbow back, the bathroom door opened.

Great, thought Lily about her mother's timing. Can't bother coming out when she's being called a slut and bint, but can bustle out when little Tunie was about to get what she deserved.

Mrs. Evans did not know what those girls were up to now, as she carefully put away her items before helping out Severus. "Lily, what were you thinking tucking in Severus tighter than a pig in a blanket?"

"Me?"

Between hearing his name mentioned, feeling the blanket's edge stretched tautly over his adam's apple, and his arms pinned and unable to stop the strangling sensation, Severus woke. Intolerant of the tightness of the covers, he was free quickly and ended the blanket's garroting hold. Mrs. Evans was already hovering and fixing the blankets, "I don't know what Lily was thinking. How are you feeling?"

"Better," he replied, and put his arms on top and held everything down as Mrs. Evans got the hint that he did not need any assistance.

"Hungry?"

"No, thank you. I'd rather just go back to sleep." Even if his head no longer hurt and he wasn't still tired, he could see all three of them in their nightclothes.

"Water?"

"No, thank you," he replied again. If he wasn't so focused on getting back to sleep after whatever they were doing woke him, he might wonder why the three of them were just hanging about, pretending that they were waiting for him to wake. Lily and Petunia looked angry, and that was strange. Usually one would be angry, and the other happy. Well, that was a bit of a lie, more like Petunia angry at Lily's happiness, and Lily happy when Petunia was happy. Both angry – meant he did something? Petunia wouldn't want him for anything, and if Lily wanted him, it wasn't like she wasn't bold enough to wake him up and pester him with nonsense about what the gaggle of girls would be wearing tomorrow.

At first he tried just laying on his back, but the pain in his head throbbed even with his eyes closed again. Severus turned to face the wall, and rested two fingers on the bridge of his nose, putting a little pressure on the side to distract him from the continuous ache behind his eyes.

The Evans' ladies gave each other looks and silently finished whatever they needed to, before going to bed and turning out the lights. Mrs. Evans purposely took the place nearest Severus, in case he got worse during the night.

Lily wasn't done with Petunia, and lay down next to her mother glaring at the back of her sister's head. She had a lot of nerve with those fevered imaginings. To think, earlier this summer, Lily thought she had made headway with her sister, and then for no reason whatsoever she explodes with vile lies. She knew that Petunia was upset that she still was friends with Severus and felt he was the 'wrong sort', but really! If she was sneaking off with Severus for a snog, like girls did with other lads at school, it wouldn't be anything like she described. The way Lily's toes curled and her feet tingled when they put their lips together in a modest kiss was not the beginning of something evil and ugly.


	21. Chapter 21 DoubleplusUNgood

Chapter 21 DoubleplusUNgood

Lily awoke in the strange hotel room, feeling rather out of sorts. Not bad enough to call it unwell, but definitely not right, and her enthusiasm over it being September 1st was dampened. It wasn't late, but definitely later than she intended to wake up. Petunia and her mother were already dressed and sipping tea at the table next to the window.

She had wanted to wake before Petunia and … at the very least poke her in the stomach after she did it to Sev last night. There may be no forgiving this, unless her sister confesses some sort of insanity in her apology. Well, that was the only reason for that outburst last night – pure madness.

Severus was still asleep. Now sprawled on his stomach with the covers down to his waist. He better be well after sleeping close to sixteen hours. The more Lily thought about it, today could turn into a disaster. What if those Slytherins ended up snubbing her roommates? Not that Lily was the vindictive or violent sort, but if that happened, she would definitely encourage Severus to creatively eject them from the train so they'd end up having to walk to Hogwart's. As long as it didn't involve turning anyone inside out.

Some tea would get her sorted, she decided, as she joined her family at the table and gave Petunia a dark glare to let her know there was no forgetting what she said last night. Her sister looked rather peaked, probably up all night consumed with guilt. Lily cheerfully greeted her mother good morning, and then ignored Petunia with a disdainful toss of her red hair.

Mrs. Evans suggested, once Lily was dressed, they eat breakfast downstairs and bring some toast back up for Severus. There was plenty of time till they needed to be at the station. Lily thought that sounded perfect, she could go practice for a moment in the mirror to see if she could imitate one of Sev's looks of disgust, and then she could use it all through breakfast on Petunia.

************************

Throughout the United Kingdom, wizarding and some not-so-wizarding households were being thrown into disorder, as Hogwart's students, both old and new, prepared to descend upon King's Cross to catch the Hogwart's Express for Platform 9 ¾.

Many agreed with the Marauders, that this could be their best year ever at the ancient school.

This enthusiasm was not shared by Argus Filch, however. This could be the worst year ever. Mrs. Norris and him agreed that September 1st was an ill-omened day when the unmannered swarm of muddy-shod, filthy-fingered vermin returned to muck up their lovely, clean castle and befouled his hallowed broom closets for their sweaty rendezvouses. This year Mrs. Norris and him would be ready to catch and punish them all, especially the foul brat who kept leaving sticky lemon sherbets about.

************************

When they returned to the room, Severus was still asleep. Lily leaned over him, and thought that he might not be well yet. He was sleeping through the inconsiderate amount of noise Petunia was making, and was comatose enough to be slack-jawed and drooling. Not that anyone would accuse her best friend of being attractive, but this was bordering on repulsive. He better not doze off on the train and look like this in front of her roommates.

"Sev," Lily said with a gentle nudge to his thin shoulder, then a harder one when his eyelids remained closed.

He opened his eyes, took a deep breath, but looked dazed as he pulled his face off the pillow to look at Lily.

"Alright, Sev?"

Severus squinted then muttered, "I have a headache draught in my trunk. That'll fix ..."

Considering that his sentence just trailed off, Lily offered, "I think I saw it. Hold on."

She did know exactly where it was, and handed it to him. He made some sound of thanks and drank it down. Severus then sat still a moment, and tilted his head a bit. He then looked over Lily's shoulder and quirked an eyebrow. "Ruin Tunie's shopping?"

Lily kept her voice low, "Later. We had a huge fight … but I don't know why."

Sighing as he slowly got up, he muttered, "Is it worth repeating then?"

She thought for a moment, then said quietly, "Yeeesss."

Severus chose what he wanted out of his trunk, and Lily's mother suggested, "Why don't you have some toast and tea, Severus?"

Not comfortable in what Lily chose for him to wear to bed, even with his jumper covering the y-front, he answered, "I'll get dressed first."

Mrs. Evans didn't have much to do to set the table for Severus, but between her, Lily and Petunia, nothing was out of place, and Lily had already staked her claim on Severus' trunk. He was not long in the bathroom changing. Not having a range of choices, he was plainly dressed in the black trousers and white button-down shirt that he would wear as his uniform tonight when they got to school. While he was putting laundry with last night's, Lily inquired, "Feeling alright?"

He shook his head, then added, "It's better than yesterday," before he obliged Mrs. Evans and ate something. Severus ignored Petunia, and she reciprocated.

When it was time for them to checkout and then go to King's Cross, Lily didn't know how to feel about Petunia not going to the train station. She was nineteen, Lily was mad at her, but the whole point of the deal was Petunia was supposed to be here to see Lily off to school. The Evans were about family, and it just seemed to go out the window whenever Petunia got into a snit. And a very unreasonable snit at that.

Lily felt some vertigo when she went through the barrier at King's Cross to enter platform 9¾. Both her mother and Severus noticed she had stopped. Her mother was feeling her forehead, when Severus pulled them both to the side, commenting that they were going to get run down by a luggage trolley. Lily had imitated Sev and shrunk her trunk for a change. It gave her a bit of a panicky feeling because she was empty-handed without the trolley with her trunk and owl cage, but dizziness from crossing the barrier? It must be anxiety over this arrangement, and it was all Helen's and Mary's fault for suggesting it.

While they were to the side, out of the way of trolley traffic, Severus was observing the crowd. He indicated her roommates together with their parents searching the crowd, and that Rosier and Wilkes were nearby with theirs but had not made a move. All four had arrived early, so it could indicate the plan was on. He suggested, "You let your friends know that we will save a compartment, I'll tell the Slytherins. Don't linger, in case they want to introduce each other to their parents."

Lily understood the need for a compartment, but they still had time before the train filled, so asked, "Why not?"

"It's alright for us to sit with them on the train, but neither of us are the right sort since our families don't have any social standing in respect to theirs." With a glance at Mrs. Evans, he added, "In the wizarding world."

Having already shared with her mother the plan to have Slytherins sit with Gryffindors on the train, her mother knew there was something going on, but felt that Lily was being a bit silly over the whole thing. It was perfectly alright for three ladies to sit with three gentlemen. If these fellows didn't want to sit with Lily and her friends, she was sure there were plenty others.

"Helen and Mary aren't like that, Sev."

"You can't predict their parents, and I can guess about the Slytherins. If we are acting in a subordinate position to them by offering to go ahead, and let them deal with important things, that might spur them. If not, we'll have a compartment. We need one anyway."

"You are trying to trick me by sounding practical. I'm sure if things go sour, my roommates will join us at least."

"Bye, mum," Lily said, turning to her mother and hugging her. She suffered a few questions about her health, then Severus got two, and then she wished them both a safe trip and a pleasant year. Mrs. Evans stayed to see the train off, like she always did.

************************

After the two of them behaved like 'subordinates', Lily and Severus quickly found an unoccupied compartment in what she considered a prime section of the train. If things were going well, then Helen and Mary's plan to be seen would work here, if not, Lily's alternate plan of grabbing two other lads had a better chance of giving them a good selection to choose from.

Lily sat very close to Severus, and when he started to slide down the seat to make room, she put her hand on his leg and said, "We'll move once they get here."

Satisfied that he wasn't going to move on her, she asked him, "That headache potion didn't sort you?"

"My head isn't hurting, and I'm not nauseous so I can keep civil if you Gryffindors can behave yourselves and stay off me."

"Stay off you?" teased Lily, leaning into him more. She rested her head against his arm and commented, "I'm not feeling one hundred percent myself, but I can't complain about any real symptoms to call it sick."

Tentatively, he put his arm around her shoulders, and Lily responded by holding his other hand.

Mary MacDonald and Helen Parkin were thinking things were going well so far. Even though they were using magic, Rosier and Wilkes offered to see to their trunks. They stopped when they saw that Lily and Snape had secured them a good compartment, and were sitting closely together holding hands, in a 'more than best friends' way. He looked less ugly today, and then Helen blurted out why, "She got him to wash his hair."

"You're right. Could still use a cut. About time that Lily started molding that lump of clay, it will give her some practice for when she gets a boyfriend and needs to get him sorted for marrying."

When they knocked, Snape stood up and put his back to the window to allow the ladies to choose their seats first. The newcomers insisted that they continue sitting together, and that they would sit together with one boy next to them, and the other opposite, and then change places once the trolley came, or Lily and Wilkes went to join the other prefects for a bit. With that, they could then sit nearer the other Slytherin for the rest of the trip. Even though this sounded like a casual suggestion, neither Lily or Severus were fooled into thinking it was spontaneous. The Gryffindors had given the seating arrangement a lot of forethought.

They were still fussing over seats when Evan Rosier and Malcolm Wilkes arrived. Once the full-sized trunks were stowed, Helen and Mary told everyone where to sit. There was a slight change when Lily insisted Severus take her window seat because she would need to go to the prefect meeting later. It wasn't a great reason, but she thought that if Sev was being untruthful or felt worse during the trip, it would be easier for him to fall asleep in the corner, rather than risk him leaning onto Wilkes … and drooling on his housemate.

After five of them, excepting Severus, discussed the weather and how fine this summer had been meteorologically, the discussion lost Lily when they started talking of how their families knew each other, who was related to who, and what acquaintances they had in common. At this stage, everyone in the compartment agreed to use their first names, and there was a small laugh because Evans and Evan were so similar.

Malcolm Wilkes was a smooth conversationalist, who executed a flawless transition to quidditch by commenting on the blood red button on Mary's non-school cloak emblazoned with a silver meat cleaver. Of course, Mary was a fan of the Wigtown Wanderers, and as a Gryffindor chaser would one day hope to play professionally for her team. Talk of Hogwart's quidditch was firmly divided by house loyalties, however once the topic of James Potter no longer being allowed to play for Gryffindor was mentioned by Evan Rosier, Mary unleashed a wave of vitriol that Lily did not know her friend was feeling. There was mention of quidditch in Mary's letters that Lily dutifully read but did not weigh heavily.

"That toerag and his friends wrote Gryffindor parents to complain to the school to get that slimy perv back onto the team. Without that fat-headed berk the team stands no chance? Well … hello, the team has two other chasers. And to listen to him sometimes, especially when he's nicked a snitch, Potter can play seeker better. He can play keeper better. Hell, Gryffindor only needs one player on the team – James 'Quidditch' Potter."

Lily and Mary were surprised. Quidditch was important to Helen, but obviously someone had gone too far. The Slytherins allowed her to continue because this kind of outburst was … entertaining.

"Freakin' know-it-all acting like he's Merlin's gift! Was telling everyone last year, that he'd be captain this year. I deserve to be captain a hundred times more than him, no matter what rubbish comes out of his mouth about how I stole it from him while he was banned. To hear Potter tell it, it's like he invented quidditch, and is the only one capable of understanding or executing a bit of strategy. Excuse me, it's called the Parkin's Pincher, NOT Potter's Pincher and the Parkins have been playing quidditch since at least 1422 when they founded the Wanderers."

Although unwell, this was just too tempting to allow to pass. Severus fueled the fire by stretching the truth, "I've seen you play. All of us have. You are a team player, Parkin. The number of assists you execute, surely is a testament to your skills and what you bring to the team. Potter? If he picked the quaffle up under the opposing goal, he'd insist on personally taking it all the way to the other end of the field, rather than passing it to better positioned chasers. No comparison can be made on number of goals, since Gryffindor is burdened by such a greedy, self-serving player."

"Absolutely," Helen replied back in agreement. "He would naturally count points scored, when he rationalizes the way he monopolizes the quaffle by saying he's the only one who can get it to the hoop. And Potter's intolerable after a game, win or lose. Always whinging on about how we don't pass it to him enough. And then back in the common room, when his lapdog, Pettigrew, starts, 'James was open', 'James could have scored', 'you're never looking at James' … well, excuse me, I got other things to do during a game than watch James Potter fly in circles, fixing his hair."

They all laughed at that one. Potter had some fixation with his hair, and spent much of the day with his hand on his head, making it look worse than when he got up that morning.

Evan joked, "You know how they have mirrors stuck in the muggle vehicles so they can see themselves? Potter needs to add one of those to his broom so he can admire himself during the game."

"In addition to Pettigrew keeping a pair of omnioculars on him, so he can watch himself later?" Malcolm asked.

"Oh no, it's Pettigrew who watches it later. From what I hear, it's for _personal _use," Mary said conspiratorially.

"Well, if that greedy toerag got himself unbanned. He's still got to try out for _this_ team captain," Helen said, tapping a finger to the middle of her chest.

Evan nodded, appreciating the irony and suggested, "If he gives you too much trouble, you could always give him a history lesson on the Wanderers, and show him how a cleaver works."

Wilkes pulled out a very nice pocket watch. "It's about time for Evans and I to go join the prefects. I hope to Merlin no one's jinxed the train's toilet. It gets so old, especially when they hit every Gents at school outside Slytherin."

Rolling his eyes, Evans said, "Tell me about it. At least as a prefect if you have enough boys queued, you can commandeer the Ladies. I have little firsties that can't hold it begging me to cast _Impervius_ so their things don't get ruined." With a sly grin, he got in a dig, "Especially pathetic when it's first year Gryffs."

Severus couldn't be bothered with talk about loos, when Lily left with Wilkes. Rosier was entertaining the two Gryffindors with stories about how poor little Evan would never dare do something to the WC at home because his two older sisters would lock him out, waiting till the next rainstorm to get a shower. Maybe Rosier was right about being able to snag the attentions of both of them, he certainly had it now with talk about his sisters, their husbands, the wedding that happened over the summer, the eldest one's child. They were eating it up with a spoon.

Normally, Lily was not one to feel motion sick, but the walk through the swaying carriage seemed a bit rough today. On the way up to the compartment at the front of the train, Wilkes and her passed the Marauders lounging in the one they took over. It looked like a full Honeyduke's rubbish bin had been dumped in there with them.

"Evans," called Potter to get her attention. He was hanging out the doorway of their compartment, having seen her go past.

"What?" she replied, and had to stifle a giggle when his hand started messing his hair up. Thinking about them opening her blouse in June was certainly enough to sober her up.

"Alright, Evans?" he asked with a huge smile.

Black leaned out also and shouted, "Oy, prick! What are you waiting for?"

"Language, Black," snapped Wilkes. "We're going to the prefects' meeting, as if it's any of your business."

Potter looked like someone had punched him in the gut as he asked, "Together?"

"We're both prefects, Potter," Lily explained. "All of them are invited."

"No!" Black exclaimed. He did not get rid of Snape, for slimy Wilkes to swoop in and steal Prongs' girl. Wilkes could groom himself, if nothing else.

The train lurched a little to the side, and Lily shifted into Wilkes, who was braced for any changes in the car's movement so he was able to put a steadying hand on her, without the two of them going down in a heap in front of the Marauders. "Let's get going," he suggested, and guided her forwards while keeping an eye behind him on those Gryffindors. They had a habit of attacking people when they weren't expecting it, especially when the whole pack of them were together.

With a defeated attitude, James Potter sat back down.

"Forget her, Prongs."

Peter agreed, "She's not worth it." If he were a girl, he'd go out with James or Sirius in a heartbeat.

Offering better advice, Remus said, "Women are attracted to different things, James. Maybe Lily likes the unknown, with the possibility of danger."

"Who better to be with than Prongs, if there's danger?" asked Peter.

"Me," Sirius answered.

"This is serious, Sirius," Remus reminded him, even though he was using one of their oldest jokes to say it.

James interrupted, "No, no, no. This isn't making sense. Wilkes sleeps in the same dorm as Snape. No way he'd run the risk of being used as a target dummy for whatever Snivelly's cooked up."

"Or the killing curse," Peter suggested with a shudder.

"Snape and Evans are childhood friends, Prongs. He might like Lily seeing his school friend, Wilkes," Remus suggested.

"No way," Sirius interjected. "Snivelly doesn't look at Evans as just a friend."

James made a face. No, it was too horrifying … he could taste a little bit of regurgitated cauldron cake coming back up in his mouth.

"Even he's got to realize that there's never going to be another female in his life, other than his hag mum," Peter laughed.

"We'll just go back in the train and see who she was sitting with," James said with determination.

Peter questioned, "How will we know, when Evans is at the prefect meeting?"

"Leave that to me, Wormtail," Sirius boasted. "A couple smiles and winks, and MacDonald and Parkin will tell us everything. Might even get a couple kisses too," he added with a knowingly raised eyebrow.

"When have you kissed MacDonald or Parkin, Padfoot?" asked Remus.

"They've been dreaming of it for years."

"I think those are called nightmares," James said as he went out the door, and moved towards the back of the train with the other Marauders following.

"Y'know if I didn't love you like a mate, Prongs, I'd be hurt," Sirius complained as he tried to push past James in the tight corridor. "With all the help I'm giving you with Evans too. Tsk Tsk."

"Help? You called another prefect 'prick' just minutes ago."

Sirius waved his hand idly, "I tell it like it is." He hadn't told the others about the curse, because uh … well, James said when they first met he couldn't stand the Dark Arts. And a little pox wasn't Dark Arts … but maybe he'd tell him now that the book was reduced to ashes. Maybe when the news got out that Snivelly wasn't feeling well, and wouldn't be back at school. That would be the right time to say something. Maybe better once he got his first date with Evans under his belt, then he'd know it was the right thing to do.

James and Sirius saw MacDonald and Parkin chatting up a storm, with Evan Rosier between them? Rosier was in Slytherin! Without discussion, Sirius slid their door open and yelled "Oy!" He had plenty more to say, but lost track of it when he saw Severus Snape sitting on the seat opposite them, next to the window. "What the hell are you doing here?"

Even though his headache was starting to return, Severus would have a sneer for Sirius Black, even if he was on his deathbed.

Parkin asked, "What's it to you?"

MacDonald was speaking at the same time, "Can't knock first?"

Rosier was the most polite, and asked, "Can we help you?"

Black was growling at Snape and glaring back with just as much contempt.

"What's going on here?" Potter asked, after a number of inappropriate questions were rejected.

Peter was agog as he looked up at the luggage rack, and saw MacDonald's marked trunk next to one marked as Wilkes'. They were together since they boarded the train at King's Cross?

Parkin replied to Potter's question, "We were minding our own business, and you louts came busting in here."

"But … they're Slytherins," Potter explained.

MacDonald snarled, "And you lot are pigs."

Black stepped fully into their compartment and reached up to take Parkin's trunk off the rack above Severus. "Come on, get their stuff. They can come sit with us."

"Unhand my trunk, Black."

Lupin suggested, "If they want to stay, Sirius, you should really listen to them."

"They must have put a charm on them, Moony," Potter explained as he reached for MacDonald's trunk.

Both Black's and Potter's hands were hit with Stinging Hexes. All four of the seated passengers had their wands out, and were not about to be pushed around by the Marauders.

Shaking the worst of the sting away by instinct, Potter and Black drew their wands. Pettigrew drew his, but stayed outside the door.

"Everyone, just put your wands away," Lupin announced, moving into the doorway and holding up his hands to show his wand was not out. "This is not going to work."

"Because it's not four on one, Lupin?" Snape drawled, with his wand pointed at Black still. Losing his clothes wouldn't be good enough for Black, the conceited rooster would probably enjoy strutting around the train au natural.

Potter was covering Rosier with his wand. Parkin, sitting next to Rosier, had her wand out too, but saw the opportunity to show James Potter how she scored a goal. He was standing right in front of her with his legs slightly apart. Just one swift kick upwards and she'd be yelling 'Score!'

************************

Wilkes kept his hand on Lily's arm till they almost reached their destination.

The meeting started shortly after they arrived, and it was rather like the one they attended last year, except Lily liked Frank and Alice. This Slytherin Head Girl and Ravenclaw Head Boy did not want to work with each other, and were trying to outdo each other with how bossy they could be.

Their bickering was grating on Lily's nerves, on top of how sick she was starting to feel in this overcrowded compartment. The meeting broke apart when someone silently passed gas, and a fierce argument commenced over who did it.

Without a male counterpart from sixth year Gryffindor, Lily would have been without a teammate to work the train, but Wilkes exchanged a couple words with the snooty sixth year Slytherin female prefect, and then rejoined her in the passageway.

Feeling unsure of how he'd take it, she said, "I'm not feeling too well, Malcolm."

"After that, who would be?" he quipped, while holding his nose to indicate how powerful the stench had been.

"Yes, but in addition to that, on the walk up here, I started feeling motion sick, and then that meeting … well," she lowered her voice and continued, "I think things were better run last year."

"Let's go back then. There's eight prefects with shiny new badges ready to throw their weight around."

Normally, Lily would not want to shirk her responsibilities, but she didn't want to make herself worse. She enjoyed the Welcoming Feast every year, and she could help pick up the slack with the younger students later.

With other prefects behind them, Wilkes did not hold Lily's arm, but did have one hand hovering behind her as they worked their way back through the train. The Marauders were absent from their trash-strewn lair when they passed it. Lily was disgusted at the wrappers and half-eaten items all over the floors and seats, and whatever was smeared inside the outer window. They better not be making a mess somewhere else, or Merlin help them, Lily would unclog the toilets using their heads.

Figures that the gormless wonders would be blocking her way just as Lily was about to reach her goal and have a nice sit down with the girls, Severus and these well-mannered Slytherin lads. She put her hands on her hips ready to give Pettigrew and his friends a piece of her mind.

On the other hand, Wilkes knew the Marauders well enough that talking only worked once they were outnumbered and had their wands out of their hands. People who tried to settle things with their words, got the same treatment as the Marauders' victims. They were not above attacking prefects either.

Without giving Pettigrew a chance, Wilkes shoved the pudgy Marauder into the wall and snarled viciously, "You better be putting that wand away, Pettigrew, or I'll be snapping it."

Surprised by someone showing up to help the Marauders' prey, Pettigrew dropped his wand to the floor when he saw it was Wilkes, wand already out, that had pushed him aside. Wilkes kicked Pettigrew's wand further down the hall … right to Evans. Excellent, Evans was one of the good guys, she'd give his wand back, and then they'd sort Wilkes and show him what a mistake he made by trying to pick on Peter Pettigrew.

Lupin turned his head, looking away from the standoff in the compartment, to see Wilkes heading right for him, Pettigrew rubbing his stomach, and Evans reaching down to pick up a wand. Maybe now they could settle down and talk reasonably.

Wilkes saw that Lupin was so cocky he hadn't even bothered to take his wand out, and was standing in the doorway to cheer on Potter and Black. All he needed to say was, "Out of the way," and the sycophant was stepping aside to give him room to see clearly into the compartment. Wilkes didn't trust him to actually step past and expose his back.

Lily moved past Wilkes, holding both her own wand and Pettigrew's. This time she was ready for whatever the Marauders tried since they had proved themselves quite capable of attacking opponents without their wands out, especially her.

Disregarding how things appeared, with six witches and wizards holding their wands on each other, Potter smiled brightly, and exclaimed, "Evans! We were just moving yours and the girls' things to our compartment so you can join us there."

Parkin and MacDonald verbally disabused that claim. All argument stopped as they broke out laughing as Potter messed his hair.

"You're all mad," Black declared.

"It would be mad to go back to that sty you created, Black," Evans proclaimed. "I want you lot back in there, and I want it cleaned up before we reach Hogsmeade."

"Not just mad, absolutely barking mad, if you think we'll be ordered around like house elves."

"This is not a negotiation," Wilkes interrupted. "I'm a prefect. Evans is a prefect. And Parkin can tell you what to do with yourselves too, since she's a quidditch captain."

Staring at Parkin, Black cried out, "No. There's some mistake. James is going to get back on the team, and he's got to be captain."

Parkin raised her lip in contempt, and quietly said, "Oh really? Did you two go crying to your mommies that it was not fair that the big kids wouldn't let you play with them?"

"No," Potter replied. "Why are you acting this way? We're a team."

"A team whose captain only wants team players, Potter." Parkin laughed as she continued, "Or is this going to ruin your chance at your lifelong dream of playing every position on the national team and win the World Cup single-handedly for England?"

Potter frowned. He may have mentioned a couple times that he wanted to play for England one day. The rest of the Marauders all agreed that it would be brilliant, but Parkin was twisting his words and making him sound like some conceited jerk. What had Snivelly and his death eater friends been telling them? And even more puzzling, why would they listen to a bunch of lying Slytherins?

"You're crazy," Black replied.

"You four are, if you think you can do whatever you want," Lily snarled. She had had it. She was sick, and she wanted these berks out of here. "Get that compartment clean. Even if you aren't in any position of authority, you should be setting an example for younger students, instead of mistreating them."

"Evans, I don't know what you've heard, but we would never mistreat ..."

"Can it, Potter, before I give you your own wedgy jinx so hard, that the back of your waistband comes up over the back of your head and doubly serves as a blindfold."

The Marauders just threw their hands up in disgust. Girls! Wedgies were just good, clean fun among lads. Bit of horsing around to pass the time. What did they expect, fellows to sit around sharing make-up tips and styling each others' hair?

Lily threw Pettigrew's wand at the back of Black as he exited last. As he handed it back to Pettigrew in the corridor, he explained, "Thanks, Padfoot. They snuck up on me and cast a disarming spell. Moony and I would have held them back otherwise."

Sirius just nodded. Of course it went without saying that Moony and Wormtail could have held off Wilkes if he wasn't such a sneak and attacked people without warning. Dirty Slytherin. Anyway, it seemed his plan failed and Snape was one of those few that actually got a booster cure every five years, as recommended by St. Mungo's. Everyone knew you didn't need a booster cure, if everyone else got them. Stupid hypochondriac Slytherin.

They reached their compartment and all four agreed it didn't look so bad. Ignoring the untidiness, the Marauders sat down to discuss what could possibly be going on, and how they were going to free the three sixth year Gryffindor girls from whatever thrall the Slytherins had them under. Let's face it, those three losers didn't even play quidditch.

************************

Feeling like she had reached the end of her rope with yet another pointless fight with the Marauders, Lily just dropped onto the seat and said, "I don't feel so well, Sev."

Twisting aside, ending up with his back pushed up against the outer train window to avoid Lily sitting on his lap, he mentally agreed she looked about the same as he felt. Sick.

Snape's Slytherin roommates exchanged a glance, someone intentionally getting physically close to him while not involved in an altercation? Obviously delirious with fever because friendship only went so far.

"The trolley came by while you two were at the meeting. We got extra for both of you," Mary indicated the small pile of wrapped food and offered Lily a sealed, single-serve bottle of pumpkin juice.

"Thanks, Mary," Lily responded and shifted forward to accept the juice. When she did that, Severus took that opportunity to reclaim his seat. Lily looked to the side to see why he was nudging up against her, and muttered, "Sorry, Sev."

She declined Wilkes' offer to allow her first choice at the sugary loot, and leaned against Sev's arm, enjoying how good the juice tasted.

Suddenly, Severus made an annoyed sound and started scratching his the underside of his hands and muttered, "Is there a jinx to make palms itchy?"

Unable to resist, Evan Rosier asked, "Are they also hairy?"

There were a couple giggles, but Severus seriously answered, "No. Or at least not yet."

Wilkes asked, "Snape? I think you got your mates mixed up, Evan."

Groaning, Rosier replied, "Oh no," and slapped his hands over his eyes. "Why'd you have to remind me about that … now there's going to be puked chocolate frog everywhere."

Loving gossip, Mary asked, "Who?"

"I'm afraid what happens in Slytherin, must stay in Slytherin, fair Mary. Suffice it to say, we have never caught our comrade, Severus, in such an act," Malcolm Wilkes replied.

"Ugh," blurted Severus in disgust. He gave a shudder and continued, "Did it even look like he was enjoying it? And those noises."

Wilkes and Rosier laughed. Mulciber didn't care who saw or heard, and it was rather revolting.

Helen suggested, "Well, then how about we share a secret about each other? Nothing bad, but something no one would suspect."

With a crafty gleam in her eye, Mary added, "Since Lily and Severus are such good friends, maybe they could tell each others. Lily tell us something about Severus."

"Uh …" she looked at her best friend, drawing a blank. Then Lily said, "He shaves using a charm."

"Duh, who doesn't?" Helen asked. "You have to give us something a little more secret than that."

Annoyed, because it sounded like Lily was the last person to know that wizards shaved with a charm, gave a bit of a huff, then said, "Sev snores."

Malcolm laughed and said, "I think half of us knew that too."

Severus was not helping her with any hints, so Lily fished through her memories of what about her friend surprised her that was not horrible. She stopped biting on her lower lip, and announced, "Severus enjoys cucumber sandwiches made by my sister."

There were some puzzled glances, so Severus elaborated, "Lily's sister may be a muggle, but she is excellent in the kitchen." He did not tell them that he was only allowed the misshapen rejects, but the filling and consistency of those little sandwiches was absolutely perfect.

Not pleased with such a insignificant revelation, Mary said, "Hopefully you can tell us something a little more secretive about Lily, Severus?"

He shrugged then said, "She likes snooping through things. Not sneaky, because I let her go through all my stuff, rather than warding it. It sort of like she's playing a game and putting together a puzzle."

"And all you came up with it that Severus likes cucumber sandwiches?" Evan asked.

"Well, I didn't want to blurt out the really secret stuff," Lily replied with a relieved laugh of her own. Her friend could have said any number of embarrassing things about her.

"So Evan, what about Malcolm?" Mary asked.

"Oh, I don't know. He only has one secret I know of, but we have another prefect here. And Lily's not known for her sense of humor."

Lily said, "I have a sense of humor, just not for jokes that hurt people."

Malcolm said, "It's not like that at all. If I'm guessing correctly about what Evan's talking about. When I see small bits of rubbish around, like broken quills, ink caps, corners of parchment … you know, I transfigure them into those lemon sweets that the headmaster likes. The house elves are going to clean them up anyway.

"And for Evan, his secret is that he can't stand going without a meal and nips down to the kitchens whenever the food's gone off at our table."

"How does the food go off between the kitchen and your table?"

"Someone thinks they are being funny. Used to think it was Snape actually because he's such a picky ass about what he eats, but it started happening when he wasn't there. Besides, if you listen to him about food, you know that he could be a lot more creative. Earthworms on the platter of chicken, dirt sprinkled on top of the scalloped potatoes, toast with hairs that also tastes like its been dragged over Mrs. Norris' butt, catsup puddings, pitchers of gravy instead of juice? All juvenile stuff. I'm pretty sure it's the house elves polluting cereal with raisins though."

Just as Helen and Mary were going to expose each other, their compartment door opened, and Regulus Black announced to the fourth years with him, "There's my hero."

Not one of them acknowledged themselves as the object of Regulus' adoration. He came into the compartment, and said, "No need to be modest, Snape. I've already told my mates how you outsmarted my troll of a brother once again over the summer. Just wanted to let you know in person that I appreciated it, and got over a week of amusement from him walking around the house talking to himself like a crazed house elf. Probably don't even need to warn you that he was swearing revenge."

Telling tales to Slytherins was a sure way to have everything get muddled up, so Severus muttered, "I didn't do anything. Your brother is only blaming me for his own stupidity."

Regulus wagged his finger and slyly agreed, "But isn't that the beauty of it? Having the restraint and patience to let him."

Severus only shrugged. He really didn't care what Regulus thought. This did not seem like he was calling in the favor of giving him a house robe and tie in June so he did not have to tolerate it.

"They had no business there, and then get Magical Law Enforcement on our doorsteps asking questions. I don't know what they told them, but the one that showed up at my house made it sound like I spend my holiday hanging round a pub," Lily explained. For Severus' benefit, since his father seemed to frequent that one, added, "Not that there's anything wrong with that pub. If a student doesn't have a magical family, any spells cast around their house looks like underage magic to the Ministry."

Can't Snape put a muzzle on her? Regulus thought. Jeez, who wants to hear about a mudblood's hardships? Instead of cuing the violins for Evans' insignificant tale of woe, let's cue my exit music. "Well, didn't want to bother you, when you're obviously in the middle of something here. However, I truly wanted you to know how much I prize what you did, even if it seemed like so little."

When he left, Evan Rosier rolled his eyes, "Black. Didn't even knock. Always acting the prince."

Malcolm agreed, "Both of them. They won't admit they are alike, both arrogant berks."

Still feeling unwell, but with her blood boiling, Lily said, "Well, at least the younger one hasn't taken it upon himself to relieve his boredom by threatening other students' siblings and then destroying a muggle pub for kicks. Their next stop was probably one of our houses, if the muggles hadn't jumped them."

Evan laughed, "He was beaten up by a muggle?"

"Potter too, it was in Lily's letter," Parkin added with a laugh.

Severus sat silent, rubbing at a persistent itch through his shirt. The Marauders' failure over the summer was old news. With the introduction of Regulus Black, what would be next, reliving the 'June affair' when he was completely disrobed and Lily's chest was exposed with a jinx? Surely everyone had a long enough laugh over the summer to not need to continue reminiscing about it for the next two years till they graduated?

Lily didn't seem to need him to continue the conversation about what happened, even though she technically wasn't there, so he just leaned the side of his face against the cool glass of the window. His headache was so bad, Severus wondered if he could skip the Welcoming Feast. Would Wilkes already have the password?

His recuperating doze was interrupted when Lily bothered him. Why couldn't she leave him out of it? The pub was improved, and Potter and Black didn't get into any real trouble, yet again.

"What?" he asked.

"You don't look well, Sev. Are you alright, 'cause you look kind of greenish."

"I think it's the light in here," Mary suggested. "You look green too, Lily."

"Uh … not that I really want to know if you got a pimple, Snape, but that one on your neck looks a little too purple," Evan Rosier said, while not moving closer to investigate. If Evans didn't seem to mind touching him, she could get an eyeful of it.

Malcolm said, "You lot look normal colored. It's just them, and I think you are right about that thing on his neck. Uh, did you two drink any potions with dragon ingredients, or travel to … oh where was it? They had a couple cases somewhere this summer of dragonpox."

"Godric's Hollow."

"We don't live near anyone magical," Lily said. "And we only brewed the potion for class and bottled it. It didn't have any dragon liver or blood."

"Perhaps in the group that was questioning about the pub. Someone was about to come down with it. That's really how the pox spreads. Before the pox are visible, it's already contagious," Helen said knowingly.

Malcolm stood up, and announced, "I'm going to let them know up front."

"But what if we don't have it?" Lily asked. Even though Helen's explanation made sense, that one wizard that she met was at her house five or six weeks ago. If he came down with dragonpox, wouldn't they go backwards through his cases to make sure everyone he contacted, while contagious, got a dose of the cure?

"Better safe than sorry. We have less than an hour before we arrive in Hogsmeade, but I don't think we should wait until we're pulling into the station to decide if you look sicker."

Mary suggested, "Maybe it was something those Marauders cast on them to make them turn green slowly? Make us look foolish to run around crying 'pox'.

Evan was scratching his chin, because even the mention of dragonpox got him itchy, and countered, "Why cast it on both of them? Snape was sitting in here, and Evans didn't come till later. Casting it on just one of them would have done the trick."

"I am itchy," Severus commented.

Lily touched the one spot on his upper neck just below his chin, and said, "Sev isn't the spotty sort. I don't think this is acne. Can you undo a couple buttons so I can see where you were scratching earlier?"

It didn't take more than two buttons to see that there were ill-looking purple bumps on his green-hued skin further down his neck and on his upper chest. The other four started scratching themselves because they couldn't help it.

Wilkes put up his hands, "Well, there's no use in pretending it's something else. You two have dragonpox. Severus is just breaking out in pustules faster than you, Lily. You are almost as green as him now."

AN: Helen Parkin is OC to set up Lily's year similar to Hermione's. Parvati Patil and Lavendar Brown as best friends, sharing a room with Hermione. If I only used Mary MacDonald, then it seems likely that with only two girls sorted into that house/year, they would have to either be the truest of friends or have some valid reason to dislike the other.

Evan Rosier is a canon full name, but Wilkes did not have a first name mentioned.


	22. Chapter 22 Beginnings of Pandemic

Chapter 22 Beginnings of Pandemic

Severus was allowed to rebutton his shirt to the top, and go back to leaning against the dark window.

Lily saw that the three students sitting across from her, were trying to restrain themselves from scratching, and had slid together to be bunched up on their seat closest to the door, furthest from her and Sev. If this had been planned, Lily would think both her roommates wanted to get close to Evan Rosier.

Now wasn't the time for thoughts of levity. What was going to happen? Lily knew she and Severus had a contagious disease that would last … how long?

"How long does it take to get over dragonpox?" Lily asked.

Mary shrugged, "Depends on how bad you've got it. Severus has more than a little, which would only be a rash between his toes and sneezing sparks."

"Sneezing sparks?" Lily repeated.

"Yes, but he's got the pustules which is a regular case. He'll probably be green long after those clear up."

"So how long with the best case, just a rash, to worse case with pustules, and then after that till the green is gone?"

"Till October?" Mary guessed. "The green well that's months."

Helen said, "The most important thing, Lily, is not to scratch those things. They leave marks."

"Most important thing? What about missing a month of school?"

Evan interrupted, "I know you are thinking of school now, Lily, but dragonpox marks will last you a lifetime. You are a decent looking sort so it would be a pity that this could hurt your looks long-term."

"Decent looking?" Mary asked indignantly.

"Well, if I started off too heavy-handed with compliments, than it might sound fake when I tell the two of you anything nice. Better for me to start off as a low-browed baboon and show improvement. After all, this is just a train ride, ladies. The added excitement of conflict and debilitating illness to your scintillating conversation and wit have certainly intrigued me enough to consider future encounters."

"Oh, so which of us do you prefer, Evan?" Helen asked. Her interest piqued.

He took a bit of a breath to delay answering, then said, "I really need to discuss it with Malcolm first. If he is firmly set on one of you, and that happens to be the same one I was fancying, it might get embarrassing, if we didn't sort it first."

"And Lily?" Mary asked, then added, "after her dragon pox clears up, of course."

He raised his eyebrow to convey whatever they thought it could mean, without saying anything. Lily Evans was muggleborn. Why would he or Malcolm even consider her for … serious girlfriend? Is that what this was going to turn into with Mary and Helen? They were going into sixth year, and after working their way through casual Hogsmeade trips with Hufflepuffs, Ravenclaws and younger Slytherins, it was time they got around to giving a short list to their parents for making permanent future arrangements for marriage. If they found no one suitable at Hogwart's, there was time to wait, but their parents would expect them to make some attempt now, or else all choice would be taken out of their hands. Merlin help them if they were forced to marry some foreign witches, better a Hufflepuff or Gryffindor than that. Ravenclaws were questionable, Evan didn't think he'd want a wife that would prefer a good book over him.

Lily didn't know why her friends were suggesting her to Evan, or for his friend, Malcolm. Severus was so confused over their friendship that he might not be ready to accept that she would like to go on fun dates with boys. As Mary said, once this dragonpox cleared up, and she wasn't green anymore. If she ended up with a couple marks, well, Severus would always be there for her, as a friend, but anyone else that she was interested in wouldn't be so shallow as to see a tiny imperfection and blow it all out of proportion. It was what was inside that counted.

Malcolm returned and said, "They are in a right snit up there. You'd think between a Ravenclaw and a Slytherin, one of them would be able to think clearly. You're absolutely right, Evans. Longbottom would have been pompous and bossy, but would take charge, rather than pointing his finger around to lay blame."

"Uh … I didn't say Frank was pompous and bossy. Rather that things went smoother with a Head Boy and Head Girl that work together."

"Don't get your hopes up. No way these two will shag each other," Malcolm said as he pulled his trunk off the rack. He opened it and took out the uniform items he needed, and placed his casual cloak inside. Like Severus, he was already wearing black pants and a white shirt.

When he lifted his back up, he offered, "Can I get either of yours down, ladies?"

They both accepted, and when Helen took out her school robes, Lily saw the Quidditch Captain badge already in place.

Not to be outdone, Evan replaced their trunks in the racks, and then took down his own. While he was messing around in it, Malcolm said, "All of us are to stay in this compartment till everyone else is off the train. It was my suggestion that they let one of the prefects at least tell Hagrid. Since he has the firsties and the boats, our tentative course of action is to get in the last carriage, and take you two up to the Infirmary once the crowd has moved into the Great Hall. If another staff member is free, we'll adapt to whatever they say."

************************

As the train pulled into Hogsmeade station, the Marauders were ready with a plan of action. Its simplicity was its brilliance. Evans, MacDonald and Parkin were in Gryffindor. They ate and slept with Gryffindors. They may have more classes with Slytherins now, but that wasn't until at least tomorrow. Besides Slytherins took things like Arithmancy, one of the stupidest subjects ever invented.

Anyway, back to the plan, the Marauders would purposely sit wherever they sat tonight at the Welcoming Feast and gather information on whatever … this train trip was. Considering their trunks were together in the compartment, that meant that they had been together since they boarded in King's Cross. Both groups were equally capable of clearing a compartment of younger students, so they were not forced to sit together.

Until they had more information, they would continue to speculate wildly on this turn of events. Now if it were the Marauders sitting with Slytherins, it would all be one big brilliant joke, however after a year of Evans as prefect, they knew she did not have a sense of humor. Well, contrary to whatever Prongs was claiming, she did not find anything funny and usually sounded like a mom about tidying up after themselves. They also had to consider Moony's point that Parkin was the Gryffindor quidditch captain, and no matter how crazy she sounded, on her first day as captain she would not willingly team up with enemy Slytherins for jokes or some other oddball plot.

With all evidence clearly supporting that the Gryffindors were unwillingly sitting with the Slytherins, they needed to determine why. Through subtlety, the Marauder mantra for this evening, they would question them to see if each girl felt strongly about one Slytherin in particular. That would be proof of an illegal love potion. They would also observe them for glassy eyes, vacant stares and drooling which are all signs of an enchantment. There was also the most desperate possibility, that the three were all victims of the _Imperio_ curse. Only one Slytherin would need to have cast it on all three, and they knew Snivelly was capable of casting Unforgivables.

The Marauders entered the Great Hall muttering 'subtlety', more for Padfoot's benefit then their own. His original suggestion had been to jump the Slytherins and beat the truth out of them.

************************

The wait for the train to clear was unimaginably long, and the milling around the carriages … some students gave the decision who they rode with an inordinate amount of weight, as if they would be spending the rest of their lives with their fellow passengers.

Wilkes went inside and harried the stragglers out of the Entrance Hall with the threat of taking points for loitering. There were no staff members waiting here for them, so they would proceed up to the Infirmary. He returned outside to tell the others that the way was clear.

At the carriage, there was a problem because this time Snape was not waking up. He had been befuddled earlier when they boarded the carriage, but that had not been a hindrance since he was doing whatever Lily Evans told him, and she was willing to grab his arm to guide him.

They discussed their options. Some nasty ideas may have occurred to the Slytherins, but they would not keep the Gryffindors' good will if they abandoned or hurt an unconscious person, even if it was Snape. Rather than letting their adventure turn to all doom and gloom, Rosier offered to carry Snape across his shoulders, kidding, "If I use a spell, and aren't careful, I'll ruin all Evans' hard work and get Snape's hair dirty again."

He also got to show off his muscles to the ladies, and knew Snape was thin enough to make it look easy. Wilkes would walk in front, either to explain to a staff member that this was not a kidnapping, or to intimidate any student out of bounds.

Neither staff nor students were encountered on their route from the Entrance Hall to the Infirmary. They were starting to feel a bit nervous at this lack of supervision, but when they arrived at the Infirmary, both Madame Pomfrey and Prof. Slughorn were waiting.

Catching sight of Lily, Pomfrey tutted and said morosely, "Definately dragonpox. Sit down over there, dear." She indicated a chair near her office.

Slughorn told Rosier, "Put him down next to her, and you four go to the Feast."

While Rosier was still holding Snape up in the chair, Pomfrey cast _rennervate_. His eyes opened, but their dullness gave him the appearance of remaining dormant inside.

"Well?" Slughorn asked Pomfrey.

"I'll have to treat the whole school with the cure. Everyone that was at King's Cross will have to be notified too."

"We were in Diagon Alley yesterday, Madame Pomfrey," Lily informed her, trying to be helpful with keeping this disease from spreading out of control.

Slughorn grabbed his hair, and yelled, "Whatever possessed you this time, Snape? Causing a pandemic through wizarding Britain now?"

Lily was surprised at his raised voice. This must be the side of Slughorn only Slytherins saw.

"And now, you are dragging innocent Miss Evans into your schemes. Isn't it bad enough you leech off her in Potions class? You are a despicable, no-talent maggot who can't learn to stay in his place. I'm off. Someone's got to let the Headmaster know of this disaster, and it's my sorry duty as your Head of House."

Yelling after him, Lily tried to correct his misconception, "We didn't know we had dragonpox, Professor."

Turning to Madame Pomfrey who was doing something with paperwork, Lily explained, "We didn't know until we were almost in Hogsmeade when we turned green."

"No one is blaming you, Miss Evans," Pomfrey replied as she straightened folders. "You should be more cautious in the future," she said with a glare to the inanimate Snape, "after this valuable lesson. You might be in St. Mungo's for weeks, and have plenty of time to consider what's happened." She then added as an afterthought, "I'm sorry, Lily."

"St. Mungo's?"

"I have room for quarantine here, but with having to administer the cure to so many, I won't have time to take on any unnecessary or extra care when it can be done at the hospital. Don't worry, they are very good and have experience with dragonpox."

It sounded very reasonable for Lily to go to hospital with an illness like this, but after Prof. Slughorn's unreasonable outburst blaming Severus for them getting sick, and thinking back to how she thought Sev was being silly about Madame Pomfrey and not wanting him to 'dirty her linens'. And she was going to miss weeks of school, and who would visit them in St. Mungo's and get her schoolwork to her? At least here, once the cure was administered, she could have had visitors, right? Would her mum even be able to get to St. Mungo's? And if she could, would it be far from where they lived, so she'd have to spend hours on the train alone? She could come with her father on the weekend, and pay twice the fare when they were trying to save money and that's why they didn't go on a family vacation this summer … Lily started to cry.

Severus showed some sign of life, and reached over to take Lily's hand, and said softly, "They never believe the truth."

With a self-depreciating laugh through her tears, Lily muttered back, "We don't know the truth of how we caught this."

"Why would that matter to them?"

Madame Pomfrey bustled out of her office, extinguishing lights, wearing a cloak and carrying some folders. "Right. Let's floo over to St. Mungo's so I can order dragonpox cure, and get back in time for the first of the tummy aches."

Lily wiped her face with the back of her free hand, stood and tugged at Severus to follow along with her hand that was still holding his.

Pomfrey already had the fire lit, threw in the floo powder, clearly announcing, "St. Mungo's." She indicated they should enter with her hand, and said, "In you get."

Severus didn't separate from her, and Lily felt glad that her first floo trip was with someone because it wasn't as safe-feeling as everyone had made it sound. Severus steered her out of the grate when they arrived, and Lily tried to stifle a sneeze from all the ash, but a painfully choked one shot out anyway, accompanied by sparks shooting out of her nostrils.

"Charming," Sev muttered with a gleam in his eye, before going back to pretending that no one was home inside his head.

They were quickly joined by Pomfrey, who marched past, telling them, "Stop lollygagging around. I have to get back to Hogwart's."

The witch at the front desk knew Pomfrey, and could also recognize the green of two cases of dragonpox. Severus and Lily were led away quickly as Pomfrey handed over two folders, "Here are their medical records. I need to get cure to treat the entire school, and there's going to have to be something in The Daily Prophet and over the wireless …"

************************

Sirius muttered, "I don't think this roast is appreciating how _subtle_ I am being. Let's slap it silly while we wait."

"Quiet, Padfoot, I'm thinking," James replied. The three sixth year Gryffindor girls weren't here, the three Slytherins weren't at their table, Prof. McGonagall should be with the firsties, so where was Prof. Slughorn? That man never missed a meal. Since some barmy new bloke was at the staff table, that was the new Defense guy, but there was still a third empty chair at the staff table. Who was not here yet? All James' teachers were here, Dumbledore, Hagrid, that spacey Arithmancy guy, the Ancient Runes crone with those creepily thick, magnifying spectacles … he thought that one in the odd clothes taught Muggle Studies …

"Where do you think they are?" Peter asked, interrupting all the Marauders capable of thought.

"If we knew that Wormtail, then we'd be off to rescue them, wouldn't we?" Remus asked pleasantly.

"Shouldn't have left the map in your trunk, Padfoot."

"Oy, how was I supposed to know slimy Slytherins would be abducting Gryffindors at the Welcoming Feast?"

Peter stood and pointed at the door and excitedly exclaimed, "There they are!"

"Sit down," James said, yanking him back onto the bench.

"And you were afraid I would be the unsubtle one?" Sirius laughed.

Remus and James joined him, while Peter turned red.

With sudden realization, James asked, "Where's Evans?"

"Where's Snivelly?"

Seeing how the Marauders' greatest enemy was unaccounted for and could still have Lily Evans in his greasy clutches, all attempts at subtlety went out the window as all four Marauders got up and pushed aside other Gryffindors in order to sit around Parkin and MacDonald.

James barely had his bum on the bench when he demanded, "Where's Evans?"

MacDonald gave him a disgusted look and said, "Infirmary. Now bugger off. We don't want to sit with you lot."

Parkin added, "Yeah, couldn't get a clue when we obviously walked right by the seats you were saving for us?"

Ignoring the rising wave of other feminine voices around them, Potter asked, "Why's Evans in the Infirmary?" while Black asked, "Where's Snape?"

Lupin wasn't as immune to the complaints, and one of the Gryffindor girls actually grabbed him by the back of the hair pulling him off the bench. "Go sit with the rest of the pigs at the other end."

Pettigrew's tormentor gave less instructions as she elbowed him in the side and called him, "Swine."

Lupin realized it first. The Gryffindor table was divided into one half boys and one half girls. The fellows were not coming to their rescue, but were beckoning them to join them in at the safe, and definitely more sane, half.

All four of the Marauders were subjected to pinches, elbows, knees and outstretched tripping feet that also kicked as they retreated to safety. The Ravenclaws were openly laughing at them. No one laughs at the Marauders! Students were supposed to laugh _with_ the Marauders.

As they reached the lads, the Marauders were peppered with comments and questions about how crazy they really were. The nonsense of the Breast Baring Jinx was not forgotten, and certainly not forgiven. That was just one more thing now that the Marauders had to do – clear their name by finding the real perpetrator. The rest of the blokes were sure until they did, there would be no dates from any house for Potter, S. Black, Lupin and Pettigrew, and all other Gryffindor men would be viewed with suspicion as possible lechers.

Sixth Year was turning into a drag already with all they had to do, before the first class even met. They spent the rest of the feast prioritizing all they needed to do. James and Sirius would not relent on what was more important – Evans or Snape. Remus did comment that Evans should be safe in the Infirmary, and Peter felt that visiting Evans was preferable. They also had to get James back on the quidditch team, and it wouldn't hurt their chances any to expose Parkin as the crazy maniac she had turned into, so James could be captain too. They also had to remember everyone that was outside in June with them when those jinxes were cast. Even though they had blamed Snape, they knew it wasn't him.

************************

They didn't have far to go because the Magical Bugs and Diseases Ward was on the second floor of St. Mungo's. The two healers that were with them seemed nice, and weren't blaming them for catching dragonpox … as yet.

The four of them stopped at a desk in their ward, they took a moment to glance through the folders, and the younger healer said, "Why don't we get you two changed, and then we can fill in some basic information that's current. Might have grown since you were eleven," she said with a smile.

"Rooms across the hall from each other good?" she asked rhetorically.

Looking into the empty four-patient room, Lily said, "No. This place is empty and I get bored real easy. Just more convenient to put me in the same room with Severus since I'd be in it the whole time anyway."

The other healer pointed out, "You are female. He is male."

"So? We've been best friends for almost ten years, and I've never held it against Severus that he was born a boy. He's a good listener despite that."

Severus shrugged. He'd like to be near Lily, but his head just hurt too much to think of a convincing argument.

"Excuse us," the younger, and more sympathetic seeming healer said, as she opened up one of their folders.

Lily stood next to Sev since he swayed a little. Bit negligent to leave sick people standing around … but Lily supposed that could be her fault.

"Right then, you'll keep an eye on him?" said the healer as she led them into a room with four unoccupied beds.

Lily didn't answer. If they were in a hospital, wouldn't they take care of them?

The other healer added, "I'm still going to put detect charms on _both_ of you."

Rolling her eyes, Lily thought 'detect away' sarcastically, just because a boy and a girl were best friends didn't mean they were doing anything they weren't supposed to, and in case he hadn't noticed, they both had dragonpox. Not exactly the time to get all romantic, was it?

The younger healer took her to the bed across from the one they were giving Severus. That was good. Then they could see each other straight on without having to get up, if they got really sick. This healer was being rather thorough in making sure Lily knew how to use the call button, especially if something happened with Severus.

Lily started asking questions about different things, but the healer gave her some hospital pajamas and told her to change. She'd have plenty of time to figure out everything in addition to the call button, and the loo for them was just through that door. She gave Lily the choice of dressing behind the curtain that could be put around her bed or in the bathroom. Since Severus was already curtained off, she chose the bathroom.

Emerging in the baggy drawstring trousers and the short-sleeve shirt that had a couple ties in the back,

Lily found the two healers doing stuff with Severus, sitting on the edge of his bed. She wondered if he had been purposely obtuse and put his shirt on backwards. His tied in the front.

After she enlarged her trunk and stowed it in a similar position to Severus' on the other side, she went over to find out what was going on. The two healers were working as a team, while the young woman was asking Severus questions and taking notes about his dragonpox symptoms and posing questions about where he could have caught it, the surly, older male healer was doing charms that were allowing a magical quill to fill out a sheet of parchment with spaces designated for various measurements. The self-inking quill was able to write in both black and red. Lily leaned over to read the chart to see what the difference in colors could be …

"Miss Evans," said the male healer, interrupting his series of spells and pulling the chart away. "Although you have already identified yourself as Pals for Life with the patient, you are not allowed access to his medical information."

Lily crossed her arms over her chest, and refuted, "I was just looking. I'm interested in what kind of spells you were casting, and what they recorded because I'm interested in becoming a Healer."

"Merlin help us."

Ignoring him, "Will I be able to look at my own chart?"

"Yes, if you go back to your bed and sit patiently. We're almost done over here."

She rolled her eyes. Lily got the message loud and clear that he wanted her to sit down and shut up, even though that's not the way he said it. One day, she'd be a great Healer, and maybe even his boss. Then she'd remind him of this day, she thought with a bit of glee as she went and sat down as he asked.

Lily took up drumming her fingers on her crossed arms as they got around to finishing up over there, and gave Severus a couple potions and told him to lie down.

"Alright, Miss Evans. Let's get cracking. What symptoms have you noticed?" asked the female healer.

"Other than a feeling of being unwell, only that I'm green," Lily responded and looked at the blank parchment form being set up for her by her partner.

"Mr. Snape said you live in an area inhabited by muggles so rarely come into contact with wizards over the holidays. Do you remember the name of anyone in particular?"

"I only met one wizard all summer. He was from Magical Law Enforcement. His name I think was Gumboil, and that was six weeks ago. Some classmates thought it would be funny to report me for underaged magic use."

Although she said it like they should believe she never did magic out of school, the healers had seen both her and the other patient enlarge their trunks, so she was looking for sympathy in the wrong place.

"No headache?"

"No."

Lily saw the form was getting filled out by … Helbert Spleen, with a name like that, no wonder why this healer was acting like he had a broomstick up his bum.

"Nausea?"

"No."

"Dizziness?"

"A little earlier when I was on the train. I thought it was motion sickness."

"I am not observing any spots on you yet. Did you notice any while changing?"

"No."

"Any itchiness yet?"

"A little, but it might be because I know I have dragonpox."

"Alrighty then. For tonight, you can have a light sleeping potion, if you like."

"What about the dragonpox?"

"The cure only works before you actually break out in them or turn green. That's why St. Mungo's recommends the lifelong series of boosters. If we could administer the cure after someone was fully in the grip of the disease, then we'd prevent practically all deaths from it. Now that you've both contracted it, you won't need to worry about boosters."

"Oh. Do many die from it?"

"It's only worrisome for older wizards. The young usually breeze right through it, and at your age, you shouldn't have anything to worry about except the lingering greenness and pockmarks."

"I was told if I didn't scratch that I'd have no pockmarks."

"Mmmm, that's not really true. The blisters will form if you scratch or not. When they burst, if they were of the larger,deeper variety, they can leave a mark. Scratching will aggravate the wound, making it worse, which is why people say that it's the scratching that causes the pockmark."

Looking down, Lily saw her form was now complete in all black. "Why isn't there any red on my chart?"

"Everything's in a healthy range."

She barely got a look at it listing her height and weight, when he tucked it into the folder. She'd show him.

Lily called over, "Sev, ask to see your chart so you can show it to me."

"Miss Evans," the younger healer admonished, "he's asleep. Although he can see his chart, it is rather underhanded of you to ask him to show it to you to try to circumvent rules. Besides, he's in hospital now, and will be here for weeks. Those scores are sure to improve with proper care. Think of tonight as just a baseline, so we know what areas to concentrate on while we have him under our care here at St. Mungo's."

During the explanation, Lily had recrossed her arms. Lily Evans underhanded? No, it would be underhanded to ask to see it when the healers weren't around. She was merely defiant.

Helbert Spleen added, "You may also want to consider that while you feel merely unwell, your friend may have a worse case of dragonpox than you. It's too early to say, but at the rate his pox are breaking out, if he only got the first one about four hours ago, he could be in for a rough time. Until it's determined how ill he is, could you please restrain your overwhelming enthusiasm over your friendship, Miss Evans?"

Lily frowned. Did he mean something dirty when he talked about their friendship? Ignoring his ignorance, she said, "I know he's had a bad headache on and off since yesterday. If Severus was well, you'd immediately see a difference in him. How much worse will it get past the headache and pustules?

"There are a whole range of symptoms. We can keep the headache pain reduced. The pox break out in a couple waves, break open, then scab over. Once the last batch scabs, it's no longer contagious. You'll be in hospital a bit past that stage."

Lily declined the sleeping potion, she had some thinking to do.

************************

James Potter did not know why Pomfrey's panties were in such a bunch earlier when he went to visit Evans. Sure, there were a bunch of young students hanging about crying and whinging about tummy aches, but he and the Marauders were not there as patients. They were there as loyal housemates come to visit Evans.

When no one saw Evans in the common room, James decided he'd just go for a stroll with his invisibility cloak and visit her anyway after curfew. If she was asleep, he wouldn't wake her. Maybe just leave her a note to let her know that he stopped by and was thinking of her. Perhaps he could go fetch a flower from outside too?

First things first, make sure Evans is in the Infirmary. Can't go getting ahead of himself here. Knowing how the girls were acting, she could have snuck up to her dorm room while they were at the feast, and they wouldn't say anything. They wouldn't even say why she needed to go to the Infirmary, even when he begged for information. Why were girls so unreasonable? They were nigh impossible when they were in packs. Once he got Evans on a date, James would set her straight.

James found the infirmary totally empty of patients. All the overeaters from the Feast had been sorted and sent back to their houses. Even the side room, that they had always supposed was for sick staff was empty. Drat. No notes, no flowers.

Returning to the common room, the Marauders were still up and entertaining other boys. James approached Sirius and asked, "Padfoot, I need to look at the map."

Sirius nodded. He had been meaning to check it to find Snape himself.

Peter and Remus followed them up to their room. It was great being back, all here at school. Their room was just like it had been since first year when they first got together and formed the Marauders, the greatest group of friends ever known at Hogwart's.

The other three crowded around Sirius as he held the well-worn, grubby parchment, tapped it with his wand, and recited, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."

The Marauder's Map revealed itself by spreading the map of the school outwards from where it was tapped with the wand. They scanned the corridors for anyone out of bounds, in addition to the staff that was still on the move patrolling the school, but found nothing interesting so divided their attention between the Slytherin dungeons and Gryffindor tower.

"Move your ass, Mulciber," Sirius urged to a dot on the map. There was a pile-up in the sixth year male Slytherin dorm room, and Mulciber's name was on top of the other blokes. No one was moving to reveal more than a piece of 'ery' and 'm Wilkes'. What a bunch of good little boys, going to bed early for their first day of class. Frankly, they all made Sirius sick.

Equally frustrated, James suggested, "We got to add a feature to get dots out of the way, like a photograph when you nudge them aside." In the tower, there was a similar stack of female dots. All the girls had taken themselves to their rooms early to punish all the Gryffindor gents. The Marauders were going to have to get that sorted soon or their own housemates were going to turn on them.

************************

After giving Petunia, the train trip, Slughorn and Pomfrey, and the healers a bit of thought, Lily got out of bed to check on Severus before going to sleep herself. This place was so boring. Least in a muggle hospital, she'd have a little telly. Hopefully, she could get her homework assignments to have something to do.

Was this what she needed the call button for? Severus' face and the one arm on top of the covers was covered in purplish blisters now. They didn't tell her how many to expect. Was this normal?

Lily went into the loo to check herself in the mirror. She had a few. There was a lot of space between hers. Leaning close to the mirror, she examined her face. Were these big and deep enough to leave marks? Touching one, it felt like it was just sitting on the surface of her skin. Don't scratch. Don't scratch. Don't scratch, she thought as she returned to Severus.

Most of his looked like hers. There were a few that had a shadow underneath, Lily prodded one but couldn't tell what the difference was. The green of their skin threw visual assessment off.

Undecided, Lily chose to go down the hall to that desk, rather than bringing someone running with the call button. She didn't want to look like a fool if this was what a normal case of the dragonpox looked like.

Lily found a different uniformed older witch at the desk, listening to the wireless while reading a book.

"Uh hi, I'm Lily Evans, and I was brought in tonight with dragonpox with my friend."

"Yes?" she said while putting a finger in the book to hold her place.

"The healer earlier told me to watch my friend Severus and call someone ..."

The healer stood up immediately, leaving her book as she moved past Lily heading towards their hospital room, and pulling out her wand. "What did he do? I was told he was on a very strong sleeping potion ..."

"Nothing. He's asleep but he's got a lot more pustules now than before, and I didn't know if that was normal."

She stopped, turned to look at Lily, and put her hands on her hips. In a condescending tone, the healer said, "That's to be expected with dragonpox. I'll take a look at him, but I'm very busy and not here to be at your beck and call."

Lily took an instant dislike to this woman. She could have just jabbed at the call button repeatedly, rather than getting up and walking down here. She waited with her arms crossed while the healer went back to the desk to get their folders, then followed her back to their hospital room.

Only having been gone minutes, Lily was surprised to see Severus' rash had spread even more to make his green skin speckled with more purple. Her own pustules were urging her to give them a nice, long, soothing scratch in response.

Unable to resist the other temptation she felt, Lily pointed at Severus and said, "See," as the healer furrowed her brow and was waving her wand diagnostically. She continued to be puzzled as she flipped open the cover of Severus' folder and looked at the notes from just hours ago. Rather than taking action, she took out a quill and ink, made notes and closed the folder.

"Right," the healer said, "might as well check you too since I'm already here." She pointed at the bed opposite, and commanded, "Bed."

"Just a sec," Lily replied. Taking her time to tuck Severus into bed, a lot looser than Petunia had done the other night. The healer let out a sigh of exasperation, went across without Lily, opened up her folder on the little table next to her bed, and set down her ink and quill there.

Working her way towards the foot of Sev's bed, Lily slipped his folder under the blanket and tucked that in too. If she found it, well, she found it. If not, she deserved to lose it, and it would turn up tomorrow.

"You are to stay in bed, or at least in this room for the rest of the night unless there is an emergency, young lady. You are not the only patient here, you know."

"I know," Lily replied as she got into bed, and allowed herself to have a couple charms cast at her person. The supposedly overworked healer wrote a couple words, capped her ink, packed everything up, and looked towards Severus' bed. Seeing nothing out of place, she left.

Lily lay still waiting to see if she came back after realizing she got back to her desk missing a folder. After ten minutes on the room's clock, Lily slid out of bed, grabbed the folder and locked herself in the loo with it. She sat on the floor with her back to the door, and flipped open the cover to find the sheet with black and red measurements. Severus weighed about a stone more than she did, but that was the first red measurement. There were reds under the blood section, but the individual measurements had wizarding names … Lily thought, she remembered reading up on this and how silly it was when wizards came up for a different name for a commonly accepted muggle scientific term. She doubted Sev could help identify these. He didn't have any muggle schooling, but maybe he could tell her what some of these did, and then she could figure out what had a similar function.

Turning to the next page, with the hospital healers' notes, Lily read the last one. 'More pustules have formed on face, torso and extremities.' Do they actually pay this woman for a medical opinion?

Agnes Pye's name was on the previous entry, and she started the page with large bold lettering. 'Self-inflicted injury risk'. Huh? This was marked as a page for Severus' file, and under this was his complaint that he had a terrible headache and that the pox had started breaking out on the Hogwart's Express, and listed other areas he had been in while in the contagious stage. What kind of nonsense was this? Lily was Sev's best friend, she had never seen him hurt himself, and he certainly didn't talk about doing himself in. Madam Pomfrey's recommendation of St. Mungo's was proving itself quite wrong, in Lily's opinion.

Lily flipped back further into the copy of his Hogwart's records to see where they got this nonsense. Alright, Sev went to the Infirmary three times in his first month of his first year, then five times in October, and then in early November, and then there was no more entries. Five years of the Marauders? Lily thought as she flipped to the last piece of paper in the folder.

It was a note from Prof. Slughorn to Madam Pomfrey.

_Severus Snape is a disturbed boy. His injuries are self-inflicted by jinx and hex to gain attention and sympathy. Please do not waste your time catering to him. He is capable of reversing anything he has cast on himself, and is not in need of assistance._

Lily flipped over the copy of the note, looking for any explanation or exception. The Marauders cast spells at Severus all the time. Everyone at school knew that. Did they forge this note to keep from getting into trouble? Surely, Madam Pomfrey would have discussed something like this with Prof. Slughorn to confirm it was genuine before turning a student away? Although Severus dislikes Slughorn, the professor was mature enough to not take it out on a student, wasn't he? Was there a note like this in every non-wealthy, non-pureblood Slytherin's medical folder? Or was it special for the ones Slughorn called 'maggot'?

She turned the pages back and stared at 'Self-inflicted injury risk' It just wasn't true. When Sev was younger, he looked forward to attending Hogwart's to get away from his family. Now, he looked forward to graduating to get away from Hogwart's. Both places had people hurting him.

Allowing her anger to override the sadness she felt, Lily slapped the folder shut. Exiting the bathroom, she tossed the folder under Sev's bed for someone to find in the morning, when they realized that someone had carelessly lost it.

************************

Once breakfast was underway in the Great Hall on the first day of classes, Prof. Dumbledore stood to make an announcement. "Thank you all for your attention. Madam Pomfrey will be scheduling every student for an appointment to report to the Infirmary to receive the dragonpox cure. Two students broke out with it on the Hogwart's Express. We'll also be letting your parents know in order for anyone that came in contact with them at King's Cross to also know they need to make sure their boosters are up to date. Please enjoy your breakfast and your first day of class."

There was no need for mystery, rumor already identified the two students as Severus Snape of Slytherin and Lily Evans of Gryffindor, it just took longer for the Gryffindor boys to get the message from the rest of the school.

Although everyone was slightly annoyed by the inconvenience, there was one individual that was taking the news pretty hard. James Potter was so distraught, he could not be bothered to eat.

"Evans?" he asked, letting his spoon fall out of his unfeeling fingers, splashing oatmeal onto his tie. "How could Evans catch dragonpox? She lives with muggles."

Peter says, "Good thing you didn't go out with her, Prongs. You'd look like a real prick for dumping her after she turned green and got all those pockmarks on her face."

"It might not be so bad, once she's better," James said weakly, not ready to give up yet on his dream of J.P. + L.E.

"I don't always look my best, and you still love me, don't you?" Remus asked. Lily Evans was a nice person, and Remus wouldn't care if she were green or scarred by dragonpox. She'd still be a good friend.

"Course, Moony," Sirius spit out, trying to figure out what went wrong. If he hadn't burnt the book, he could read the whole spell to try to piece together why more than the recipient of the cursed letter of disease was affected. Evans couldn't have caught it from Snape through normal methods because he didn't become contagious till a couple days ago, and she had it now at the same time as Snivelly. Damn the Dark Arts! There was always a catch and collateral damage. Didn't help matters that Snape had to be such a pisshead, and couldn't get sick and stay home like a decent wizard would.

His mood only darkened when he caught sight of today's The Daily Prophet headline – Dragonpox Endangers All of Britain!


	23. Chapter 23 Suffer Well

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

AN: My perception of Slughorn is that he's lazy. That's why he did absolutely nothing about the Breast Baring jinx in chap 1. He would limit how much time he invested in students with absolutely no prospects. If Pomfrey was on his case about a destitute first year visiting the Infirmary nine times in two months, what would be the easiest way to deal with it now and for the next seven years? Snape's parents haven't complained once since he's been there.

Chapter 23 Suffer Well

Severus woke. His head hurt less, his throat was sore, and he was so incredibly itchy. He had his hands out, ready to attack the worst of it, his scalp, no maybe in his ears, but he knew he couldn't so just let his hands waver in the air trying to gain some control over the increasing crawling sensation all over his skin.

"Sev?"

"Lily," his response came out as a croak. She was sitting on a chair next to his bed. There were purple blisters on Lily's green face. It looked so painful, he thought, as a noise escaped his throat.

"They left a potion for the discomfort."

He blinked to disguise that he was more upset by Lily's suffering than his own. Severus did not want to make Lily feel any worse. Lily took the cap off the potion and said, "Maybe I can give to you? Your hands are covered."

Severus looked at one and saw Lily was right. His hand was a bumpy purple. The green was visible under his fingernails, and in tiny lines where he had some a couple short scar lines from minor injuries. The burn on his inner left elbow was also free of blisters, but instead of being its normal red, it was greened, surrounded by a sea of purple blisters. If he didn't feel like chizpurfles had decided to make him their first wizard host, Severus would think this was a dream. Lily had normal dragonpox, and he was somehow infected with the never in recorded history version. However, Snape's continual companions since his early childhood, pain and misery, were always ready to keep him company and prove that this really was his life. This current torture only had a duration of weeks, followed by months, maybe years of being green and further scarred. On the bright side, his current scars were immune to pox so he would not even be tempted to scratch his backside like a simian or a professional quidditch player.

Not wanting to embarrass himself in case he really was incapable of drinking a potion without help, he allowed Lily to tip the vial into his mouth. Did he have a blister on his lip too? And the inside of his mouth felt a little bumpy too, as he swirled tongue around.

Severus made another attempt to say something, but it was more than bumps in his mouth preventing him from articulating more than a questioning grunt. This time there was a painful twinge inside his throat. Didn't he just drink a potion? The itchiness was subdued, not gone, but all the pain seemed the same.

"Don't worry. The healer said she'd be back, Sev. It was Miss Pye from yesterday. She was the nice one. She had a couple ideas for when you woke up.

"So why don't we get some of this breakfast in you. You don't want to stay a nine stone weakling forever, do you?"

Severus glared at Lily because he was not weak and had to weigh more than nine stone. Just because he was robbed of being able to articulate back, he wasn't going to be insulted and pushed around. It was obvious that Lily was taking advantage of his infirmity to now have both sides of their conversation, and didn't seem to mind one bit because now she could pretend Severus agreed with everything she said. Lily's dream come true. Could they just put him to sleep till this was over?

A spoon of something was already heading towards his face. Ugh! He turned his face away. Severus' mouth may be full of pulsating blisters, but he wasn't going to let other foul things entrance to join them.

"It's porridge, Sev. You like it."

Aw hell to the no … he ate Mrs. Evans' porridge. Her kitchen was immaculate, and she inspected the ingredients for rodent and other infestation before preparing it daily in a gleaming pot and only added fresh milk. There were no guarantees that this inferior substitute was unadulterated. In addition, wizards could preserve it even longer than muggles – this could be more than nine days old, with whatever happened to pass by falling into the pot as a bonus ingredient.

"Stop behaving like a child," Lily sternly said.

Severus didn't turn back until he heard the spoon go back to the bowl. Looking at the tray that Lily had next to her, he leaned forward to take the boiled egg, still in the shell. He cracked the shell on the edge of the dish, and then rolled it back and forth to weaken it before peeling it off. He threw the shell into the bowl of porridge to reiterate he would not eat that.

"Sev," Lily warned. He ignored her and broke the egg in half to look at the inside, before eating it.

"I'm not going to put up with this, Sev. Hospital food is not haute cuisine. Stop being so picky."

Didn't Lily realize people died in hospitals? Of course not because she was trying to push some tea on him, and there was a tea bag. A tea bag! Made out of questionable material, containing just the barest of tea dust to turn the water brown, and who knew what else.

He grabbed the tea bag by its string, hauled it dripping out of the cup and flung it towards the door. If Lily served him another, he'd fling it in her bed. What would be next? More bright orange non-cheese in a can?

Crossing his arms over his chest, he thought that he didn't want tea now anyway. He was just trying to endure his bladder long enough till he got to the point that he would not care if Lily followed him into the loo.

Severus could see Lily was getting angry. Maybe she'd go back to her side of the room. He didn't need her over here hovering over him. If he needed constant care, the hospital would assign some stranger who wouldn't be fussing over and pitying him. For all he knew the hospital already had, and like all his previous caregivers had just left him to sort it on his own.

The beginning of Lily's snit was interrupted by a visitor. Prof. McGonagall entered their room. Severus watched her with trepidation, here to visit a sick Gryffindor, or to issue some punishment for callously infecting the entire school?

"Professor," Lily greeted her.

"Miss Evans … and … uh, Mr. Snape," McGonagall replied while trying not to stare at the second patient who appeared to be more the victim of a magical accident, than a dragonpox sufferer that was admitted less than a day ago.

"Sev's got blisters in his mouth and throat and can't talk," Lily explained while Severus nodded.

A sudden thought occurred to Lily. "Professor, would you be able to take our summer homework back to Hogwart's? We completed it, but I wouldn't want someone to think we had an unfair advantage of extra time." Lily was concerned that her Divination homework would be invalid for turning in a forecast about Sev getting sick after the fact.

"Of course, Miss Evans, but all your teachers know that you are out ill. You are excused."

"But we did all our homework, Professor," Lily insisted.

"I'm sure you did. I can take it," McGonagall replied, in order to ease Lily's increasing turmoil.

Since Sev's trunk was next to where she was sitting, Lily went to open that first. "Oh no, you warded it. You never ward it at home."

Perhaps Lily didn't realize this wasn't his home as he turned his hands upward at her agitation.

"But you can't lift it now."

He rolled his eyes as he took his wand out of the bedside table, then wordlessly cast at his trunk to release the lid. Really, they weren't in first year anymore. Since Severus already knew his entire trunk had been rearranged to Lily's preferences, he slid out of bed to finally use the loo. McGonagall would protect him from any impropriety on Lily's part.

The bottom of his bare feet felt odd on the tile floor. They were cushioned with blisters, but the soothing coolness was still enjoyable. No time for that though, he steeled himself to walk normally to the loo door. Beyond that was sanctuary from Lily who was now talking about his homework. As he reached the door, Lily asked, "Is all this for Arithmancy, Sev?"

Sarcastically thinking that she would know better than him, he glanced and nodded at the solid stack of flatly stacked parchment tied together in a foot-high bundle. He liked Arithmancy and Potions, why not work on it? Prof. Abstractus was the one teacher that consistently said good things about Severus' work. He only had Lily to keep him busy during the summer, so it gave him something to do.

With a pained smirk, Severus locked the door once he was safely inside and alone. He could barely hear Lily's voice outside. If they couldn't put him to sleep all day, he might be spending some quality time in this loo. Lily could keep up her conversation without him in the room. It was better not to know what she had him agreeing to.

Looking down, he pondered his current situation. Hmm, well of course he had blisters here too. If he didn't pay it much mind like walking and handling the doorknob, he could do this himself. Severus did not want help to take a leak. Even the drunkest of tramps could do it unaided.

The pain when he slid his foreskin back to expose the glans was intense, he saw stars and blinked tears out of his eyes as he found himself now doubled over and staring straight down into the water of the white commode. He remained absolutely still as the pain ebbed, and he listened. Did he scream? Guess not, or Gryffindors would be blasting the door apart. Oh, he was so stupefied by the pain, he hadn't released his foreskin … well, if that's the case, he went ahead and used the toilet. He flushed, and slowly let it slide back with a breathy grimace and a shudder running up his spine, using the flushing to cover any possible noises he inadvertently made.

Catching a glimpse of himself in the mirror, Severus preferred to concentrate on washing his hands properly with their new surface texture. Why were the blisters on his hands numbed, but the group on and under his foreskin and his glans … they were sort of numb now, was it the movement? He could avoid drinking until he was really thirsty, but eventually he'd have to come back in here. Not that he studied other males in the gents, but some were quite sloppy about their hygiene and just let it go, without pulling anything out of the way. He didn't know if he could even do that, but he'd have to wash after, and wouldn't that hurt just as much because he'd have to clean inside too?

************************

Once she heard the lock click, Lily asked Prof. McGonagall, "Are we in trouble, Professor?"

"For what, Miss Evans?"

"Prof. Slughorn yelled at us yesterday evening for catching dragonpox. Made it sound like we did it on purpose."

"Why would he think that?"

Lily shrugged as she closed the lid of Severus' trunk. "He was definitely angry. It wasn't fair because Severus and I don't live near any wizards to even get exposed to someone sick. If it wasn't for Potter and Black blowing through town attacking muggles over the summer, I wouldn't have seen anyone other than Severus and his mum."

Following Lily over to her side of the room, Prof. McGonagall asked, "Would you care to explain that bit, Miss Evans? Those two students have not shared tales of their holiday with me yet."

Distracted from getting her homework, Lily explained the boys' fun from her point of view. "They just showed up one Saturday. Black insulted my sister at work, and tried to get her to tell where we lived. She didn't tell him, but phoned, and I was upset all afternoon waiting for them to show up at my house to cast spells, and get me in trouble for doing underaged magic. Since I'm muggleborn, the Ministry will think it's me."

"Or perhaps Mr. Snape?"

"Why would Severus do that? He doesn't want to get me in trouble. He's had plenty of opportunity to cast something because he's at my house most days.

"Anyway, they never got to my house. They stopped off in a muggle pub, got into some trouble, ended up wrecking the place and stunning a couple of them, before the muggles restrained them.

"Then poor Severus got dragged into it because his father told him to fix it. So Magical Law Enforcement gave him a warning."

"Couldn't Mr. Snape's mother have tried to sort it instead?"

"Uh... no, I don't think she ever leaves the house. Or else, I'm sure if she had been feeling up to it, Sev's father would have asked her." Lily was confused as to what she should tell McGonagall about his family. If he could get help now, well, it was a little late now that he was four months away from being seventeen, and would not even see them till after that, if ever again. If she were him, she wouldn't be heading back to Spinner's End. It wasn't just the overwhelming poverty, the people there were horrible.

"She's not well. She didn't help us with any of our homework. Severus just needed to ask her if it was alright if I came round." An idea struck Lily, and she went for it. "To brew our potion for the assignment. You know, it's not fair that Prof. Slughorn assigned more than an essay. It's not that Severus and I want to do magic illegally, but I needed access to his house because his mum is the only witch for miles and I can't do any magic at my house. How are muggleborns expected to complete an assignment that involves performing magic? That's what I'd like to know, Prof. McGonagall. When none of us should be encouraged to do underaged magic over the summer."

"I'm pleased to hear that you gave the implications some extra thought, Miss Evans. I will discuss the matter with Prof. Slughorn, in case there were any law-abiding students that were unable to complete the assignment. They should not be penalized."

"Oh, here's the potion. It's the same as Sev's, because we brewed ours together, but we did our essays individually. And here's the rest of my homework."

Prof. McGonagall had quite a lot to return to Hogwart's. Both students were taking a number of advanced courses and obviously took their summer assignments seriously. It was a shame that with Frank Longbottom graduated, that her hardest working prefect, and fine role model, was here at St. Mungo's, rather than keeping her other Gryffindors' minds on the reason they were attending school.

The bathroom door opened and Severus headed back to bed. He was moving slower than before, but seemed stable enough to make it. Lily frowned at him, sneaking into the loo without help because a professor was here.

"I really stopped by to see how you were doing, Miss Evans, and to see if you needed anything."

"Not at the moment, but if we could both get our homework assignments and any copies of notes, that would keep us from being bored. We've pretty much talked ourselves out over the summer with only each other for company."

Severus remembered that laughing would only hurt. Lily wasn't the least bit talked out.

"If either of you aren't feeling up to completing assignments over the course of your illness, your professors would understand," Prof. McGonagall replied. More for Mr. Snape's benefit, so Miss Evans didn't harass him since he seemed a lot worse off than Miss Evans. Not that she wished Lily ill, but it might help if some of her energy could be sapped during this illness to allow Mr. Snape a chance for some much-needed rest. He habitually looked unwell to her eyes.

"How about you, Mr. Snape?" McGonagall asked. "Just a yes or no, I understand, but do you need anything?"

Severus shook his head 'no'. It was rather nice of her to ask him directly, rather than letting Lily continue on about how much he wanted class notes and homework. If he felt this bad after half a day of dragonpox breaking out on his skin, it would be a waste to say he'd stay caught up with his schoolwork.

"I must return to Hogwart's. I'll be back within the week to see how you are doing."

Lily said, "Thank you. It was really nice to have you as our first visitor, Prof. McGonagall."

Severus waved. It was considerate for her to acknowledge him while visiting Lily. He didn't expect any visitors of his own. He wouldn't miss them since he had Lily to keep him company. Knowing that he was sicker than her, he was worried that she'd get well and leave him here alone. Severus didn't want her to be ill, but there was a selfish urge to keep her with him.

Lily came back over to his bed with parchment, ink and quills. "Did you want me to set up this little table so you can write letters?"

Letters? To who? Oh, that's right, he owed one to Longbottom, in case Lily was right that he was keeping tabs on Severus for when he became an auror later. He nodded to allow Lily to set things up for him, before returning to her bed to also write letters. Severus took his time writing a short boring note thanking Longbottom for his letter. He didn't even bother mentioning the dragonpox because he didn't care for a reply. With Lily writing pages, he kept the quill poised so she didn't come back over to arrange another activity for him to keep busy. He was content to watch her to fill the time. When she folded her stack of letters, he folded the one to Longbottom and addressed it.

"One letter, Sev? What about your friends?"

He pointed at Lily, and she rolled her eyes. Always pretending that she was the only friend he had got pretty old. She'd badger him every day to write letters till he started writing some real ones. This one to Longbottom felt like it was only one sheet.

She put their letters aside for posting, and said, "Alright, what shall we do now?"

Severus suspected she already knew when she asked.

"Since you don't care for this for breakfast, except for the egg. Do you want me to see if they have some sort of menu to select from?" She knew that Severus should be eating more, and maybe if he had a hand in choosing what it was, he'd be served something he wouldn't throw. Even if it was a plate of boiled eggs every meal.

He shrugged, it would all be crap. What did it matter? It might be worth it to stop Lily from trying to shove spoons of filth into his mouth. Closing his eyes since she had already thought he agreed and had left the room, he enjoyed the quiet.

Returning too soon for him, he could hear Lily already talking before she entered the room. He opened his eyes to see Lily enter and pick up the tea bag from earlier, and she had Healer Pye, the female one from last night with her. If it was the male healer, Severus may have pointed out the painful pox that prevented him from enjoying a quiet piss.

"Miss Evans was telling me that you are a bit of a fussy eater, Mr. Snape." The healer held her hand up and added, "And that you are unable to talk for yourself … or more so than usual even with your friend about."

He hurt his face with a smirk at that dig at Lily.

"Considering your health, I can arrange some variety to your meals."

Dragonpox got special food? If breakfast this morning was anything 'special', he'd pass.

"I have a listing here of what's available normally and by special request from the kitchens. Miss Evans already said that you are partial to their boiled eggs."

He nodded. If that's the best it got, that might be it. He looked at the list she was holding out. Was this some sort of trick? He'd want it, but it was liquid, and then … well, he was either going to have to show this healer or pass on the one thing on the menu he would actually enjoy.

Lily was looking at him expectantly. He had to pick something for her, or she'd be mad at him. Trapped in the same room with her ignoring him wouldn't be worth it. Severus sighed, pointed at the item, and then picked up the quill and inked it to write on the parchment with his left hand covering it from Lily - 'pox under foreskin' – and showed it to the healer.

"Yes, that's expected when you have such a bad case as yours."

What a thickhead! He pulled the parchment back and added - 'hurts incredibly'

"Did you take the potion that was left to ease the discomfort of the pustules?"

Discomfort??? Only a woman would call it discomfort, he thought as he angrily scrawled and underlined - 'very painful to have a slash'

"Maybe I should have a look?"

What about very painful needs a look? Can't he determine when he's feeling pain? This was just too much trouble to go through for something decent to drink. Pye was already asking Lily to wait outside the curtain, and was pulling it along the track to close it.

"Just lay back Mr. Snape," she said. He did, as she moved the rolling table away from the bed, but then looked at her as he heard an odd sound. She was putting on gloves, and then drew her wand. Wait, she said look, she did not say touch. He put his hands protectively over the area to clarify who would be doing the touching, if any was needed.

"Relax, I'm a healer. I've seen it all." When he did not immediately agree and move his hands, she added, "Please move your hands or I will have to restrain you."

Aren't there laws meant to protect minors from this sort of threat? He thought as he untied his own pants and arranged the blanket and pants to his satisfaction before removing his hands.

"That does look painful," she said before she swooped in and grabbed it.

That hurt, but he was able to contain that to just an indrawn breath. It was when she manipulated the foreskin to view underneath it, that squeals escaped from his throat, even though he intended them to be fully formed words as the examination continued beyond what he felt was needed to determine that he had pox there and she was causing suffering.

"Perhaps you should be on a pain potion," Pye commented as Severus tried to blink away his unwilling tears. "The number of blisters and severity of rash is going to increase."

Why was she untying his shirt? He didn't have much chest hair for her to rip out in clumps as an encore, if it could be found amongst all these purple things. Much easier to see the sparse black hair when he was his normal pale self.

"Look towards the ceiling please," she asked as she moved her fingers about and cast some spells. At least this didn't hurt so he could concentrate on the throbbing pain that continued below from her rough treatment that included negligent twisting. As her gloved hand moved higher to his throat, he realized that she had it on him lower and hadn't changed her gloves. Isn't there some sort of procedure they should follow to move from probably cleanest to probably dirtiest area of the body? What if she had these same gloves on to handle another patient?

"Sit up." He did, but had trouble controlling a shudder of disgust as she touched him again. She then removed the pajama top and asked, "Could you lift your bottom?" When he shifted, the trousers slid down his legs under the covers with a wave of her wand. Now what was she up to? "Lay back down on your front." He thought about it a moment, with her and those gloves. He had healed all his open wounds before he left Spinner's End, so he considered it safe enough to comply without getting an infection from this healer's casual disregard for hygiene.

Pye returned to whatever it was she was casting, with occasional feather touches to his body starting at the neck and working her way down. She slowed down as she neared his waist and spent quite a bit of time on the places where he knew there were scars, that protected him from the pox, and then she slowly snaked her gloved hand over his bum, which should be relatively pox-free. Pye finished on his upper thighs which also had scars where the belted stripes had missed his rear. She did not go further down to examine the dragonpox on his legs, but said, "Turn over."

Knowing that he shouldn't get his hopes up that she was done, he turned and pulled the covers up over his waist. So of course, she pushed them down. She was gentler this time, but Severus really had no idea why she would be revisiting his original complaint. It had already been diagnosed, he thought, and his original assessment that things could be painful shouldn't need further testing. Now she was poking around elsewhere down there, in an area he didn't need to touch to take a leak.

Although Pye wasn't that old, perhaps she was one of those witches that liked teen wizards? Really have to be hard up to be feeling up one as ugly as him with dragonpox. Of course, the rumor's source about such witches was Mulciber, and he was a liar.

"You've been burned multiple times on your scrotum."

What does that have to do with anything? Just more spots not to have pox.

"These were not caused by you, nor the matching burns on your upper, inner thighs."

You think?

"None of these scars were self-inflicted."

What kind of stupid test was this to get a pain potion? Afraid that he'd go setting his bollocks on fire if he couldn't feel it? What a stupid bint. But of course, Lily and him had infected themselves with dragonpox. If they really wanted to cause some damage they'd have gone hung out in the lobby of the Ministry of Magic while infectious, or maybe the overseas portkey terminal to really get it spread far and wide.

He did not need her assistance to replace the pajamas, but she waved her wand anyway. Severus was all grotty after she touched him. With parchment, he negotiated a bath, rather than answering her inane questions about his scars. A few well-worded insults got her off the subject, and back onto his wanting a bath as soon as possible. Pye said there was something that could be added to it to assist with the dragonpox. Fine, as long as she wasn't in there with him.

She also wanted to finish the meal planning thing. All he wanted was the Mackeson's stout, but ended up with a boiled egg, a tangerine and a banana plus something called shark liver oil. For the shark liver oil, he negotiated two Mackesons per meal. Wizard stupidity really knew no bounds, he thought gleefully. Severus played dumb when she talked about other meals. It took long enough to plan one. Why not serve him the same thing each time till he was out of this hellhole?

Flicking the curtain back open, Pye promised to return shortly to prepare the bath and bring him fresh pajamas. He could take the pain potion with lunch. Once he took that, he was not to leave bed. Not that Severus was looking forward to lunch, but he was getting rather achy all over.

Lily was sitting on her bed, looking at him in silence. She was more spotty than when he first got up this morning. With a sigh, he just sat still looking into her eyes from where he was. It wasn't as nice as when they laid close to each other for long periods of time under a tree, but nothing about their dragonpox and this hospital room could be considered ideal, except that they were together.

Pye returned, and walked between them into the loo with a vial in her hand for the bath. Another woman in healer robes came in, carrying pajamas and more vials. She put one set and a vial at the foot of Lily's bed and told her she could also bathe, after lunch. She also placed one potion on Lily's rolling table to take with lunch. Severus' table got three, and she deposited his clean clothing at the foot of his bed and left.

"It's all set, Mr. Snape," Pye said as she came out of the loo. "I put in your change of meal so it should be waiting when you come out. If you change your mind and want to add any hot food to future meals, just let someone know."

She stayed long enough to make sure he made it in the bathroom without assistance, and then exited their room.

It was a sign of how ill Severus must be that he forgot the parchment he was writing on earlier, Lily thought as she crossed the room. And Pye, after last night and talk of patient confidentiality … really! Lily was ready to rip the curtain aside and start hexing when she heard Severus in pain, but he wanted something looked at, and she overheard Pye saying it would get worse and that Sev would now be on pain medicine. Lily had been sitting over on her bed cursing Hogwart's lack of health or anatomy classes. She could only guess from the other burns being on his upper, inner thighs that whatever his scrotum was, it was close to there. Probably a boy part since it sounded so foreign. This parchment was covered in insults. Nasty ones too. Asking Severus anything about any injuries usually got the reply he didn't want to talk about it. He wrote 'bath' about a dozen times, and 'I want a bath', 'two then', and 'no two or no oil' once each. Where is 'pox under foreskin'? Lily understood 'hurts incredibly', but was confused by the underlined 'very painful to have a slash'. She made a slashing motion with her hand, but couldn't imagine what that could be. Hmm, she had maybe two body parts and one body function to define and was in a hospital. Lily probably couldn't wander far with dragonpox so would have to give this some thought. She could probably look at Severus herself if he was knocked out with all these potions. Not self-inflicted scars sounded interesting, more interesting than that one line on his neck. Also very satisfying to know that Severus didn't hurt himself. Very unsatisfying to know that Prof. Slughorn was a liar, and that Madam Pomfrey believed that nonsense. Lily was immediately suspicious when she saw that note. The entire school knew the Marauders attacked Severus at least once a week.

Lily scooted across to her bed when she heard the lunch trolley. The potion on her table was the one she took earlier that cleared up the itchiness. She felt fine now, but the healers knew how often she should be taking this. Her lunch was a small salad, ham sandwich, an apple and pear juice. Not great, but it wasn't unappetizing. She'd wait for Sev to eat since she didn't have any hot food to go cold.

What was in those two brown bottles on his tray? Lily went over to investigate his lunch. An egg, banana, orange, a small vial of some liquid and then two bottles of stout? Severus couldn't have anything alcoholic. His parents were alcoholics so he was very likely to abuse alcohol himself. What kind of hospital was this? She took the two bottles and put them in the nightstand for the bed next to hers. Then put her pear juice on his tray, and poured herself a glass of water. Then also poured him some water. There he'd have two drinks to choose from. Ah crap, she grabbed the parchment. If she left that laying there next to his food, he'd think she'd looked at it.

Everything was all tidied when Severus emerged from the bath with wet hair. She was sitting, smiling at him, on her own bed with her table wheeled to the proper place over her legs. "Lunch is here," Lily said unnecessarily. He could see that. That skanky munter had felt him up and not paid, and even had the nerve to include that shark shit, after they made a deal to pay him two bottles per meal to choke it down. Fine, deal's off then, he thought as he pushed the table aside into the wall, and grabbed the potions to take to bed with him. No sleep potion, he thought as he chugged them down: fever reducer, anti itch, and pain potion. That sleep potion they gave him last night was good. It kept him knocked out while all these splotches popped out. Was he only going to get that once a day?

Severus was tossing the empty vials and caps onto the tray when Lily admonished, "Sev? What are you doing?"

He shrugged. What kind of answer would she expect?

"Isn't that what you asked for?"

He shook his head so hard that he accidentally whipped himself in the face with the ends of his wet hair. He was promised something, and it wasn't here. If he got hungry later, which he doubted on this lovely pain potion, it would keep.

"Would you like any of mine? I have salad, an apple and a ham sandwich. I don't think this is processed muggle cold cuts that you can't stand, but actually regular ham."

Rather than answering her, he laid down. If he wanted to eat the flesh of a lying, disease-ridden pig crawling with parasites that wallowed in its own filth, he'd have no trouble finding one around here.

Lily ate her lunch. She knew the egg was right with his lunch. Sev could have eaten that at least, rather than pouting over something. Maybe the healer questioning him about his father got him upset?

She finished and went over to him. His eyes were open, staring at the far wall, with his back to the food. He had the covers up to his neck so she traced his arm through them with her hand, heading towards where she expected his hand to be. Severus responded and slipped his hand out to hold hers. She saw his eyes flick up at her then back to the wall a couple times before he turned his head to look up at her.

"Are you upset?"

He nodded.

"Maybe I can find us something to take your mind off it after I take my bath. I'm not on pain medicine so I can move around the ward."

Severus shrugged. Even if Lily found nothing, she'd make it sound like she was out on a grand adventure when she returned to tell her tale to entertain him. Since she continued to hold onto his hand, he eventually nodded to her, so she'd go bathe sometime before dinner. The chair was behind him so she had been standing this whole time.

Lily found the potion added to the bath made it a little tingly, but not unpleasantly so. She could lose track of time because it was so nice, and if she ran out of here too quick, Severus would think it was for him. He could be so bullheaded. Not worth it to pop back out there just to see him laying where she left him.

Eventually the water cooled, and she decided to head out to see if he stirred, ate something or if she was just going for a walk. Finding him back to staring at the wall, she asked, "Alright Sev?" before heading out the door.

Healer Spleen was at the desk. Lily didn't need to circle because he asked, "Need something, Evans?"

"Not really."

"Already heard your buddy's got pox in his throat so no talking. That would really be a drag if he wasn't such a good listener."

"Oh ha ha," Lily replied. Most of the time adults didn't pay good attention to what she said. She drifted into the ward's lounge to look at the magazines. The Witch Weekly issues were sorely out of date here, but Lily found a couple that looked interesting. She also found a magazine Lily had never heard of before called The Quibbler and thought Sev might like it. The cover story was about a Ministry conspiracy.

Passing Healer Spleen, Lily had a thought and stopped. She held up the magazines and said, "Obviously I'm starved for things to read."

"Don't you have your textbooks in your trunk?"

"I've already read ahead in them this summer. Got them early through owl order."

"Oh, pardon me. So why are you telling me this?"

"Although my interest in being a Healer didn't appeal to you last night, I thought there might be some literature I could read up on. Even if it's pamphlets on common disorders or such. I'm muggleborn so half the time I don't know things till I break out in them. We don't have a muggle style Health class at Hogwart's so I'm stuck on my lower school knowledge and with whatever conflicting rumors the girls in my dorm come up with."

Lily didn't know what she thought she'd get, but Spleen supplied pamphlets on dragonpox, scrofungulus and vanishing sickness. Well, yes, this was Magical Bugs and Diseases.

"Excellent," Lily said with way too much enthusiasm. "You wouldn't happen to have any others in this ward, would you? I don't spend too much time on a Witch Weekly."

"Like what? I can ask another department to send some around."

"I understand reversing charms, transfiguration and other accidental magic in principle so I don't think I'm behind my classmates there." Lily made a face, then lowered her voice, "You might find this impulse a little odd. With me only getting educated up till the age of ten this was kind of vague. My housemates kind of kid me about it, with my best friend being male, but it's not like Sev and I go skinny dipping or something like that over the summer. He likes staying covered up, and he won't answer any of my questions about y'know so if there's some …"

"You can come right out and say it, I am a healer, Evans."

"Oh pardon me," Lily parroted back to Healer Spleen. "It's just that I get flustered, as you've no doubt noticed."

"I don't know if you've noticed, Evans, but there's not more than a handful of people that have the listening capacity of your friend, Snape."

"True," Lily admitted. She shook her hands nervously for effect, then said, "Just on the train to school yesterday, one of those girls asked me if I've ever seen Sev take a slash."

"Uh … it's have a slash. It's not a very nice term for urinate."

Lily made the proper 'o' shape with mouth for Healer Spleen. "Why would I ever see that?"

He laughed. "Maybe you aren't hanging out with very nice girls."

"You are absolutely right. They only come round to tease me, and treat me like I'm stupid. Anyway, as I said earlier I have the education of a ten year old with regards to women, men and what goes on. There's plenty of lads at school that are willing to give me an education, but they aren't the right sort."

"At least you know something," Spleen replied.

"And Sev's no help. Except to agree they are the wrong sort."

"Don't you have parents?"

"Yes, but my mum gave me a muggle book with pictures, and I think it left a lot of important information out. I don't even know if witches come here to have babies. Muggle women go to hospitals, and Sev was born in a muggle hospital since even though he has one of each type of parent, they live as muggles."

With a suffering sigh, Healer Spleen said, "Well, I shouldn't leave you to learn from the wrong sort or you'd find out too much, too quick, and end up here in less than a year with little Lily. Although I do not hold your friend accountable for not going skinny dipping and making it seem typical that wizards just go waving their magic wands around. The cockier ones call them broomsticks. I'll get you some _appropriate_ reading material from that ward."

Lily smiled and said, "Thank you, Healer Spleen. Oh, and if you could keep it quiet when you bring it, I don't want to embarrass Severus. He gets a little freaked when he thinks I want to be more than just friends, when I get in one of these inquisitive moods."

"I can imagine."

Having gotten one of her three vocabulary words identified, Lily now understood why Sev had covered the parchment over when he wrote it. She was pestering him to write letters when that part of his body was very painful, and that might be why he was a little slow moving from the loo back to bed. He could have written her something simple that he wasn't in the mood or he was in pain.

What if one of the other words wasn't in the literature she got from Healer Spleen? It would have helped if the one time Severus did urinate in front of her if he didn't have his hands in the way. Then she might be able to guess what was where.

Severus was asleep, still facing the distant wall, when she returned. Lily was going to wait till he took a sleeping potion, and Healer Spleen wasn't around to catch her before trying to sneak a peek. He'd have plenty of time to see this odd magazine. Lily flipped through it, and was amused by some of the nonsense in it. Maybe now Severus would see what kind of company he was in thinking the Ministry was not to be trusted.

She had finished her magazines by the time dinner was served. There was another two bottles of stout on Severus' tray, along with the same food as was on his lunch tray. Lily shrugged and hid these with the bottles from earlier. Considering she had a hot meal for dinner, she went ahead and ate it, without waiting for her friend. She doubted he would be more receptive to dinner than he was to lunch.

Bored, Lily read over the disease pamphlets multiple times before taking out her Care of Magical Creatures text, resuming about halfway through the book, where she had left off.

Eventually, Healer Spleen came in. He approached Lily first, and she sat still as he performed some charms. "You don't have a fever so just the anti-itching potion. Would you like a light sleeping potion?"

"No thanks."

"I already obtained some literature for you," he said as he slid it onto her table. There were a few pamphlets and a couple larger format booklets.

"Thank you, Healer Spleen."

"Don't mention it," he said as he went to check on Severus. "Oh, has he been asleep long?"

"Since I got back from talking with you."

The healer paused to stare at Snape's tray, and then walked about to look in the rubbish bin. He knew about the stout because it was so rarely requested. It was a muggle health drink, so wizards weren't partial to it. However, he was interested if it had any positive effect on a dragonpox patient. If the patient slept through the meal delivery, why wasn't everything still on the tray? That was also the only item missing from his lunch tray, and Pye was formulating a theory on the rest of this food. She just didn't know how the stout fit in with his odd meal request. It was not as natural and pure as the other items so it might have some unknown property. If Evans had drunk it, she would have smelt like the stout, not the gravy that was on tonight's roast, and there would be empty bottles unless she spelled them away.

Snape's temperature was high. That was rare, but not unheard of with dragonpox. The lunchtime dose of fever reducer should still be in effect. He sorted through his case of potions and chose four. Spleen woke the patient to ensure that all of them were imbibed.

"Mr. Snape, before you take the sleeping potion, you should eat dinner. Did you already drink the beverages or were they missing?"

He shook his head.

"Were they missing from lunch?"

Severus nodded.

"I'll get you another one. Maybe you can tell me about what it's supposed to do. I've read over the literature, but it's rather who it's recommended for – invalids and nursing mothers, rather than saying how it aids them, other than the milk content."

Lily sat over on her bed listening. Why did Spleen think there was something else in that bottle? Ale didn't have milk and it wasn't for invalids and nursing mothers.

Rather than _accio'_ing a bottle, Spleen left the room to order it properly.

Severus looked at Lily who was staring at him. What now? He shrugged in a questioning manner. Not being able to talk didn't work when Lily didn't talk for him. He attempted to speak, but it sounded like a liquid gasp.

The healer returned with two bottles, and said, "One for each of us," and uncapped them with his wand.

Lily was in shock that the healer would drink on duty, but then was more flabbergasted when Severus drunk his in one motion, slowly tilting the bottom of the bottle higher to finish it without stopping for breath. It was as if he had been in the desert for weeks. She couldn't tell how much he enjoyed it because of all the purple pustules blocking his expression. If someone asked her last week, she would have said Severus hardly showed emotion on his face, but now she knew that she could read him even when he seemed expressionless prior to having dragonpox.

Having gotten his stout, Severus drank the vial of oil, then peeled the banana to see if he could eat the entire thing without feeling too full. He made it almost to the end, when he decided that was it.

Spleen was just finishing his bottle of Mackeson's. "This has a different taste than other muggle products I've tried. Is that the addition of the milk making it sweeter?"

Severus shrugged. He was only taking advantage of the fact that wizards had put beer on the menu.

He reached for the last potion, that would put him to sleep till at least morning.

************************

Lily hadn't thought about the moving wizard illustrations that would make some items seem a little naughty even though they were clinical in their description. She actually found them quite informative and built upon what she already knew from the muggle world. Unlike the illustrated book she had from her mother, there was a rather bland, blob of a wizard represented with parts labeled, so she now knew that Severus really did have dragonpox everywhere, but not why it was the pustules were causing him pain there in particular. Did urine irritate the blisters?

The booklet on wizarding baby making was an eye-opener. Besides the common method between a wizard and witch, potions were an option also. Lily hadn't given it much thought before now, but if two witches were partners, a potion was recommended. The wizard/warlock solutions seemed creative, but she didn't know why they wouldn't use a potion too, with one of the wizards opting for the creation of female organs to support the fetus. That seemed the most sensible solution. There was no explanation in any of this literature why two witches or two wizards would be having a newborn, but Lily could think that there had to be a personal reason such as a childless widow, not looking for a new husband.

After studying her new literature for hours, Lily decided she'd save her energy for sneaking around till tomorrow. Severus was not going to recover overnight, so she'd have plenty of opportunity to examine him while he was rendered unfeeling with potions.

************************

Why was there two more bottles of ale with Severus' breakfast? Lily thought as she removed them to join yesterday's as he continued to sleep.

After she ate her own breakfast while it was still hot, she went to sit with Severus. He looked as horrible as yesterday, no worse, if that was even possible by now. He was unable to make a regular snoring noise, there was a much quieter sound, perhaps mucus? She could see blisters inside his mouth and on his greenish tongue.

Earlier in the loo, Lily saw that she had a lot of green skin showing, compared to Severus. She had nothing in her mouth yet. She hoped she did not become as covered as Sev when the next wave broke out. What kind of pockmarks would he have, if the surface of his skin did not have any gaps between the blisters? He never seemed concerned about his looks, but even now he may not be able to fall back on his 'keen fashion sense', she thought with a fond smile at his self-descriptive phrase for his rubbish-ready clothes.

She took one of his hands between hers. It was also barnacled with purple pustules. Sev's hands weren't pretty, but Lily was envious for years of his longer fingers. They were bony, like his hands, but long fingers looked like they could do more things, and perhaps since she associated Sev's fingers with wands and magic, that made them even more special. Hers weren't short or stubby looking, but long fingers, maybe with rings, would be so elegant.

Over an hour passed with Lily holding Severus' hand before he woke. He expressed a preference for the potions first then picked at his food, eating the egg and some of the tangerine. She had to give him some privacy when he called a staff member to assist him because he could no longer get out of bed to go to the bathroom with the pain potion.

That was another indicator to Lily how much pain he was in. He'd rather endure some hurt than accept help. This level of assistance got her thinking that perhaps he was in agony without the potion. Unlike some muggle medications, Sev was at least aware of his surroundings and could respond to her.

Severus seemed pleased with the issue of The Quibbler, read it cover to cover, and then reread the article on the Ministry conspiracy by the editor, Xenophilius Lovegood.

At last, someone who was not afraid to put in print what everyone was thinking. Severus did not know anything about the invisible magical creature featured in this issue, but Xenophilius Lovegood was spot on about the Ministry.

When Lily insisted that Severus write letters again today, he decided to write one to Lovegood.

****************************

James Potter joined the others at lunch. "McGonagall is totally unreasonable," he snarled as he sat down and immediately began ladling large amounts of food onto his plate.

As Sirius wryly shook his head, Remus tried to put things in perspective, "You knew she wasn't going to give you permission to go to St. Mungo's, Prongs."

"How's a card going to make me stand out from all the others Evans is going to receive?"

"Flowers," Sirius suggested.

"No, candy," Peter corrected.

"I could sneak away over the weekend. Get down to the Three Broomsticks and floo."

"And what happens when Evans tells McGonagall you visited? You are on probation."

"Don't remind me. I had to sternly remind McGonagall that our little trip over the summer was during the holiday. Snivelly went crying to her. Dirty Slytherin snitch."

Peter said, "And she'd be all spotty, Prongs."

"So? I know what dragonpox looks like."

"But on your girl?" Sirius asked. "Be bad enough when she comes back all Slytherin green."

"That'll fade," Peter said, "Best to wait and see how many of those pocks she had messing up her face."

"Wormtail!" Remus admonished. "Prongs is mature enough to know it's what inside that counts. Evans is still the same person she was last year."

"Uh, Moony, you don't remember last year? Evans' looks were her selling point," Sirius explained.

Adopting a falsetto voice, Peter mocked, "You boys clean up this mess now."

James frowned, "Evans is a lot more than a beautiful face. She's still a Gryffindor."

They all agreed, Lily Evans was a Gryffindor. Later, they'd get to work on sending her some nice cards and items. Even if they didn't individually like her, that might get them a couple brownie points with the other Gryff girls because in two days, the Breast Baring Bandit had not struck once. What if he graduated?

****************************

Lily had hopped into bed next to Severus so they could play some word games on parchment using his table, and be facing it from the same angle. She had insisted Sev only use normal words. His repertoire of magical terms, Latin and insults were out of bounds.

When Healer Pye stopped by to check on them, Severus hurled his quill at her like a dart once she got close. Fortunately, it was not aerodynamic and did not have a pointy metal tip.

"What seems to be the problem, Mr. Snape? Losing to Miss Evans?"

"No," Lily said, while giving Severus a shove for being so rude.

He took advantage of Lily leaning into him to grab her quill, scrawled 'no ale no deal', and turned the parchment around to be right side up to Pye.

A healer bargained with alcohol? Lily was outraged and very disappointed.

"I'm sure there were bottles available."

'Spleen got two last night', and another turn.

"Lunch will be round soon. So let me get you two checked over, and then we'll see what I need to get sorted."

"Do you know that there is alcohol in those bottles of ale?" Lily asked. She was not going to be able to swipe Sev's bottles from lunch if both of them were watching out for the tray.

Pye shrugged, "It's minimal. Little more than butterbeer." She made a note in Lily's chart, then asked, "Would you like a butterbeer, Miss Evans?"

"No thank you." Thinking, Lily asked, "Won't it interact badly with the potions? Severus is taking a pain potion too now."

"It's fine," she said absently as she cast another charm and took note of Lily's current temperature. Pye closed Lily's folder and flipped opened Severus'.

"Alrighty then, Mr. Snape. How about you give me a look down your throat first?" she asked as she conjured a narrow beam of light from her wand. Looking, she muttered, "Hmm, looks like they are still the same for now. We're going to have to watch on the next wave in case they start piling up. Just continue to let Miss Evans do your talking for you," she teased.

Lily muttered, "If I could, then he'd be getting some proper meals. Can't you give him nutrition potions of some sort, instead of liquor?"

"Mr. Snape is still capable of feeding himself. If his throat becomes more restricted, we have ways to work around it. You took the fever reducing potion earlier?"

Severus nodded, and Pye made a note, before casting another charm.

"Well, let's keep you on the same batch of potions for now. You'll just need the anti-itch one, Miss Evans. And anti-itch, pain and fever reducer for Mr. Snape. And here's lunch and your two bottles of stout. So you'll eat as much of it as you can then?"

Nodding agreement, Severus was suspicious how the bottles appeared now that Pye was here in front of him to face the consequences of not keeping her promise.

"After lunch, you can take a medicated bath, Miss Evans. And someone will be in to help you, Mr. Snape. Enjoy!" she said cheerfully as she exited the room.

Getting up to go over to her bed, Lily took both bottles off the tray. Severus was already getting his wand to open them, and held his other hand palm up to question her.

"You don't need these, Sev."

He held up one finger, pointed at her, then held up his finger again, and pointed at himself.

"No, we're not going to split them either."

Severus slapped his empty hand against the covers to indicate his unwillingness to go along with Lily taking both bottles.

"You can't drink this."

Glancing at his wand in his hand, Sev looked back at Lily, visibly sighed, then turned both his hands up and just a slight creak of his voice came out.

"No. This is not open to discussion."

He slumped then Lily felt a pull on the bottle in her left hand. She held it tightly, and said, "Stop it."

The other bottle was jerked out of her right hand, and there was no longer a pull on the one in her left.

"You're being childish, Severus. Just give it back to me."

He shook his head, and reached for the quill while putting his wand and the one bottle he obtained under the covers. He wrote, 'it's allowed. stop'

"Sev, you can't. Given your parents … fondness for drink, you just can't."

'?' then he added, 'I'm not them'

"I want you to give it to me, Severus."

He stared past her, then flicked his eyes to hers, then away, before writing 'I do not like being sick. I do not like being here. For You', he then paused to underline it 'For You I give up what I enjoy'. Severus took his bottle and handed it to Lily. He looked at her expectantly.

Lily took the bottle and rolled her eyes at him, "No need to make a big deal about it, Sev." Rather than watching him wave his hands around, she returned to her side of the room to eat lunch.

No big deal? When she's carrying on about his parents and that he's going to be what? Unable to leave his own house because he can't find the door behind all the bottles to stagger out of it? If it wasn't Lily, he'd hex her, Severus thought as he put his wand away. Bloody self-righteous Gryffindor, he thought, sighing to himself as he lay down.

****************************

Lily's sleep was interrupted in the middle of the night by the busy, book-reading healer. She was doing something with Severus, waving her wand and giving him a potion. Another healer rushed in to join her with some other supplies, and he pulled the curtain shut.

Her mind was rather fuzzy, as she tried to make out what they were doing. She tried to get out of bed when the third healer arrived. This must be important as she heard mention of throat and breathing.

She felt the difference when her feet got on the floor. There were no pustules on the bottom of them, or at least ones she hadn't noticed before. The top of her feet had twice as many, along with her arms and hands. Why were Sev and her getting coordinated outbreaks? The pamphlet she read said from the time of exposure till the first signs of illness was ten to twenty-seven days. They turned green within an hour of each other. The waves of blisters also varied in between, and they got their second wave the same night.

Now Lily was dizzy, as she stood. She sat back down. Why couldn't they speak up over there? Lily wanted to know how bad Severus was. It was torture leaving her over here in suspense. Stupid prat was doing this on purpose. He was a toerag all afternoon, just laying over there ignoring her and everything else. What if this was it? The last time she was with her best friend of more than half her life, and they argued over a bottle of ale. And to top it all off, he let her win the argument, and was a bloody, self-righteous Slytherin by letting her know that he was letting her win. She folded her arms over her chest to wait.

Healer Pye also joined the group working on Severus. She also came in with a healer's case and had her wand out.

Eventually, the curtain was opened. Healer Pye walked across to Lily, and said, "This second wave piled up on top of the first batch. Totally blocked his throat. We got a good-sized tube down it now that we shrunk the swelling back a bit to shove it past. Eyelids also got it bad this time, so we'll have to keep on top of that too to prevent blindness. Better to keep him asleep till this recedes. He was in enough pain already.

"So your second wave popped up at the same time. Interesting. Besides the increase in blisters, any other changes?" she asked, while already casting charms.

"Dizziness. I wanted to come over, but it was really bad."

Pye nodded. "Your temperature is also elevated. I'll add a fever reducer to your potions. Any pain?"

"I haven't noticed any yet," Lily replied, fearful of her next trip to the loo.

****************************

Healer Pye also got her with a sleeping potion, so it was a surprise to Lily when she woke late, and found a festive addition to the room. There was two long tables of cards and gifts next to her bed.

Ignoring them, she cautiously got up to check on Severus. She was able to cross the room without mishap. Healer Pye was probably right that Sev should stay out. Lily thought his dragonpox couldn't get any worse, and now she was proven wrong. She blinked rapidly, then wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. She should have let him have the ale yesterday.

Severus had four cards on the stand next to his bed. They were a subdued bunch compared to the bright, flashing ones with sound effects that she received. In fact, if Lily had to describe them, without comparing them to hers, she'd call them tasteful. Looking at them, they were all from male Slytherin students - 6th years: Malcolm Wilkes and Evan Rosier, 4th years: Regulus Black and Barty Crouch, Jr.

After Severus, Lily wasn't ready to face her festive lot just yet, so ate her breakfast instead while occasionally giving the cheering one on the end a glare. It was just so inappropriate with Sev so sick in the same room.

Moving closer, why was there a card with a photo of James Potter winking and smiling at her, while astride a broom? No surprise, it was from James Potter. There was always a chance it could have been from Peter Pettigrew, Potter's biggest fan. Lily smiled, thinking what Helen would say when she saw this.

Sirius Black's card also had a photo but it was a picture of a big, black dog looking up with the caption 'We miss you'. Must be Black's dog, because it wasn't photogenic. Looked like the Grim, to tell the truth.

There was a sweet card from Remus Lupin, another card from Pettigrew, lovely cards from Helen and Mary, a card each from Prof. McGonagall, Prof. Flitwick and Prof. Slughorn. Where was Sev's card from his head of house? By now, he had to have realized that Sev was not out to kill the wizarding world with dragonpox. Potter sent flowers, and a second bunch of flowers, and he also sent this candy, and Remus sent this chocolate frog. Helen and Mary sent some skin cream. There were some more cards in the back here from other Gryffindors, along with a small selection of candy. All of it was quite nice.

Sev wouldn't receive flowers, and his fellow Slytherins surely knew he didn't care for sweets. Maybe he'd get more cards tomorrow. If he woke up briefly, and wasn't in dire pain, Lily could tell him who sent him well wishes.

After a bit of a sit next to Severus and holding his hand, Lily went back to her side of the room to arrange her cards more to her liking. There were a couple other boys that sent her cards besides the Marauders, but when she considered her future period of greenness, the dateability factor just wasn't there. She wasn't interested in any of these fellows that way, so all in all, it was alright. Potter's promised to see her in Hogsmeade. Uh, yeah, everytime in the past she saw him in Hogsmeade, he was acting like a complete toerag with his pockets bulging with items from Zonko's and his hands full of Honeyduke products. If Lily finally got Sev there, meeting up with James Potter would not be a highlight.

A wizard wandered into their room. If Lily didn't recognize him from Hogwart's she'd have thought he was lost. It was uh... the Arithmancy bloke, Prof. Abacus, no, Prof. Abstractus.

He stopped halfway into their hospital room, and was staring at Severus. Since she wasn't an Arithmancy student, Lily could guess who he must be here to see, but seeing how Severus wasn't up to company, she said, "Professor?"

"That is a grave case of dragonpox," he said thoughtfully as he turned to Lily.

"I'm Lily Evans, Professor. I'm sorry I don't take Arithmancy, but I am a Gryffindor prefect."

He nodded, and said, "Ah yes, Prof. McGonagall did mention one of hers was here too. Your case is also severe."

The professor pulled out a pair of glasses, and put them on. They lenses had some fiddly bits that he adjusted. Leaning closer, he muttered, "If you'll excuse me. I find the spread of disease to be an interesting study. You two caught this together?"

"We think so. We live near each other, see each other almost every day during the holiday, and don't live near any other wizarding families."

He took the glasses off long enough to get close to Severus, then replaced them on his face. "Interesting. Very interesting. Are your houses within line of sight with each other?"

"No." That would be Petunia's worst nightmare.

"But you came down with dragonpox at almost the same time? And Severus seems to have a case that cannot be described as natural. But he is unable to answer any questions at this time."

He called him Severus? "Yes. We were on the train together, and the people in the compartment noticed we both looked green about the same time."

"What is the approximate distance between your houses?"

"About a quarter mile."

Although she had seen Severus do this on occasion, seeing an experienced wizard such as Prof. Abstractus start using his fingers for counting and calculating was kind of funny.

"Hmm, no matter how I figure it, you'd only get a rash between your toes, at the worst. Unless the curse was released closer to your home. Perhaps Severus is just unnaturally susceptible to dragonpox, and coincidentally you broke out at the same time. Though of course, coincidence is usually the sign for some other pattern."

"Curse? I thought dragonpox was from potions' ingredients going off, or exposure to someone with dragonpox who was in the contagious stage."

"Normally that's true. But the origin of dragonpox was from a curse. Back at the turn of the millenium, it was devised, and its beauty was it was able to sicken a whole family if they were present when the curse was released. Starting with the recipient getting the worst, and most lethal case and spreading out to the next closest wizard or witch, and so on until it reached its maximum range. Sometimes there would be damage to families living in close proximity to the recipient of the cursed letter or object. Letters were used because they could be clearly addressed and aimed from a distance.

"Once the cure was found in the early 17th century, the curse was rarely used because recipients only had to pop round to get the cure before the dragonpox itself broke out. Kind of pointless to send it. Now its used rarely because everyone's pretty much forgot how it started because it propagates nicely on its own. Also simpler and surer ways to kill other wizards."

"A letter? Severus eats breakfast at my house a lot, and since we're so isolated, it was a habit of ours to receive and share mail."

"Share mail with a Slytherin? Or rather, a Slytherin shared mail with you?"

"Yes," Lily said indignantly. Did everyone think that Sev was a Death Eater receiving love notes from the big you know who?

"Possible. It wouldn't have to be anything significant. Back in the day, the caster might even write some sort of missive declaring their intent to the victim so they could get their affairs in order, besides knowing who cast it. Some wizards can't stand not to get credit."

Yes, Lily knew the Marauders too well. "He did get an odd note in July, but we were sure that one had a tracking charm. The second one in August self-destructed when we tried to examine it. It was really lame because all it said was 'you stink' as the message with no signature. It was pale green heavy parchment, and was addressed to Sev in a much nicer script than the interior message."

"You stink? Usually practitioners of the Dark Arts tend to be more eloquent. That makes it seem more like a schoolboy matter, but I think there's a copy of the spell at Hogwart's from the last time I did this research. There's also the cases in Godric's Hollow to cross reference for possibility of contagion."

"I only met one wizard this summer outside of Severus. St. Mungo's was going to look into it."

"Hmm, that does narrow down the chance of outside influences considerably," Abstractus mused, as he went back to doing air math. He stopped, then nodded towards the doorway, "Minerva."

"I didn't want to distract you, Atlas."

"Oh no bother, Miss Evans has presented evidence for a fascinating scenario, which could lead to an exciting solution to explain this current outbreak of dragonpox."

"Yes, you and disease, Atlas."

"Not disease itself," he replied with a touch of distaste, "the probability of it spreading or dying out, and the magical permutations that revive it. With a commonly available cure, dragonpox should have been eliminated some time ago, Minerva. If you'll excuse me, I'd like to return to Hogwart's to work on this, since Mr. Snape is unavailable to visitors."

Prof. McGonagall looked at Severus, and asked in concern, "What happened?"

Lily explained, "We both had our second wave of pox break out last night. Sev's was already so thickly packed, that the blisters kind of stacked up. There wasn't enough room in his throat for that and for him to breathe. That's the tube, and they are going to keep him knocked out till its out."

"I see why Prof. Abstractus would take such an interest. Within days, Mr. Snape has an overdeveloped case of dragonpox. He probably would have worked on the permutations nonetheless, since Mr. Snape is one of his favorite students."

"Really?"

"He's been raving about Mr. Snape's summer project since tea yesterday. If today wasn't Saturday, I'm sure Prof. Abstractus would have skived off class to come meet with Mr. Snape."

Lily smiled, "Surely not a Hogwart's professor."

****************************

After her visitors left, Lily got a letter from her mother. She had written both her mother and Petunia once so far since arriving at the hospital. Of course, her mother was concerned, and reiterated that she thought Severus should have gone to a hospital, rather than getting on the train. With Severus' current condition, Lily felt a bit guilty that she misled her mother into thinking that this disease was just something silly that turned them green. Would Lily still be green for Christmas?

****************************

Atlas Abstractus had found the book he was looking for in the restricted section of the library. Whoever cast this spell didn't even try to disguise it with a variant, but cast it as written, resulting in a pale green parchment, imbued with dragonpox and targeted to infect the named recipient, instantly spreading to all witches and wizards surrounding him, presumably his immediate family. The odd thing was, who would target Severus Snape? As far as he knew, he was the only professor that thought highly of him. He had already approached Prof. Slughorn about Mr. Snape continuing his summer project with practical experimentation, and was soundly rebuffed. Seemed a bit cold, considering Snape was in Slytherin, and according to his records, scored an O on his Potion OWL. If Abstractus was an expert in Potions, he'd willingly supervise, but Potions were not his forte.

Anyway, something about this was too odd to ignore, so he brought the Dark Arts tome to the Headmaster's office. He was missing a part of this equation, and if he needed to consult the man who had plans within plans, it was Albus Dumbledore.

****************************

Days passed for Lily. A few more cards arrived for her. Prof. Slughorn's never arrived for Severus. Letters were written and received, and she spent much of her time by Severus' side, missing him.

Both Prof. McGonagall and Prof. Abstractus visited again. McGonagall had brought schoolwork, but Lily didn't feel like working on it without Severus.

As the third wave of blisters began, her first ones were starting to scab over. Sev's next round of pustules hit at the same time, but there wasn't anyplace left for them to form so they crowded the existing ones and his skin just broke into an oozing mess. He was on a continual supply of potions that were directly administered by healers into his comatose body. Besides detection charms, healers were inspecting him every hour, even the busy book-reading one, except on her nights off.

Since looking at the breathing tube and Sev's damp, encrusted face was too much, Lily was resting her head on Severus' chest, listening to his heartbeat with just the pajama top and one blanket to keep the seepage from his blisters from her face and hair, and holding one of his hands between hers, without any protection, when a festive wizard robe came to a stop at the foot of the bed. Without moving, she could see the white beard, and then the face of Albus Dumbledore, topped by a matching hat, consciously tipped at a jaunty angle to show off the shiny bauble dangling from its pinnacle.

"Ah, Miss Evans."

She sat up and replied, "Professor."

The headmaster conjured up a comfortable armchair in a floral print that did not go well with his robe, and took a seat. He took out a small tin, and offered, "Lemon Sherbet."

"No thank you, Professor."

Prof. Dumbledore took one for himself, and occupied himself with enjoying the sweet, rather than making small talk as visitors to the hospital usually do. Both Prof. McGonagall and Prof. Abstractus were excellent visitors since they never spoke of the weather. This room had no window, so Lily would be forced to accept the opinion of anyone visiting.

Used to the silence with just Severus to keep her company, Lily decided not to ask inane questions.

She felt a slight moment of satisfaction, when Dumbledore finally spoke, "Quite quiet here. One of my oldest friends was getting over dragonpox when he started Hogwart's. That's when I first met him, when he was still green, and we were both sorted into Gryffindor. Bad skin color to wear with Gryffindor colors, but there was nothing for it, I suppose. The Sorting Hat is blind to that sort of thing."

"Yes," Lily said. The Sorting Hat would not put her in Slytherin, the house that Severus had told her about before they attended Hogwart's. With Evans coming before Snape, did he ask the hat to put him in Gryffindor to be with her? Ugh, Severus being stuck with the Marauders? Would they have tried to make him one of them? Black and Potter had already met Sev on the train. More likely that it would be Severus and Remus, and then Pettigrew still admiringly following Black and Potter.

"Elphias is still one of my best friends. Even if Gryffindors aren't sorted into Hufflepuff, we are still able to be loyal. Don't you think, Miss Evans?"

"I wouldn't let what an old hat said come between me and my best friend."

"What about what others say?"

Lily rolled her eyes. "Are you talking about what gets said about every Slytherin? I know Sev's father is a muggle, and it's not his deepest, darkest secret, so he hasn't lied his way into the Death Eaters. And, on the train this year, my roommates and I were in a compartment with two other Slytherins. Purebloods. And not once in all those hours did either one profess their undying affection for He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. As a matter of fact, we didn't bother talking about him at all."

"Mr. Snape isn't the type to blindly follow along. They'd have to offer him something of value to get his attention. He is also quite good at hiding his own worth from others."'

Indignantly, Lily corrected him, "I think it's more that they don't want to see it."

"Someone's noticed," Dumbledore quietly commented, "More than you and of course, Prof. Abstractus. He actually thinks that Severus has such an intrinsic understanding of magic that he can devise his own spells and improvise existing ones and potions."

"Severus has been doing that kind of thing for years. That's why he's the best potions partner, even if Prof. Slughorn outright lies about him," Lily snarled.

"The minimizing of Mr. Snape's accomplishments … may be beneficial."

"Well yeah, if I was that shallow to want the credit for what he does in class. But I'm not."

"I remember Mr. Snape's mother, Eileen, was reserved at school. Has she been round to visit?"

Does Dumbledore know? Why mention Sev's mum? It was his secret, not hers to go blabbing all over. Lily had already justified not saying anything to Prof. McGonagall since Sev was almost seventeen and away from them. She replied with his version of things, "She's unwell, and never leaves the house. I uh... saw her earlier this summer when Sev asked if it was alright if I came round to work on an assignment. After that we just went straight up to his bedroom."

Prof. Dumbledore merely raised his eyebrows, when Lily went on the defensive. "Why do people always assume with a boy and a girl best friend that they are always up to something? His bedroom's small, but it's not like that stupid game where they lock a boy and girl in a closet for five minutes."

"Really? That might explain one of the problems Mr. Filch has been having with his supplies being tampered with. I rather like games. What are the rules?"

"It's not that kind of game, professor. It's mean. A group takes one of the most socially awkward members and shove them in a closet with either an equally awkward person of the opposite sex, or someone with a reputation for being experienced. Then they close the door, leaving them both inside in the dark, while they stand outside suggesting what's going on and making a lot of childish noises. Hogwart's has a lot of immature students well beyond first and second year."

Minerva chose this prefect well, Albus thought. Such a shame about Remus Lupin though. Those boys were so promising, but their ability to get past petty problems or show any degree of empathy for other students, even younger ones, had never developed. Although they clearly were kind enough to send Miss Evans a card. He could see James Potter smiling on a broom among her well-wishers' gifts and cards. They couldn't be all bad, they were Gryffindors.

The puzzling thing was the placement of Severus Snape onto the board with the use of this spell. Albus did not know if he was a piece worth protecting, or where he was to be moved to gain the most benefit from his sacrifice.

AN: 'Nine stone weakling' is a lyric in Superman by the Kinks

Even though I do drink tea all morning made with tea bags, tea bags contain tea dust, the fannings or waste product of processing higher grade tea. In Snape's case, he's thinking more of anything could be in a tea bag besides tea, rather than being a tea snob.

Mackeson's Stout in UK cannot be labeled as a milk stout due to labeling requirements. It is made with lactose, and historically this brand and other milk stouts claimed to be health drinks, especially good for nursing mothers. Someone forgot to notify the wizards when that changed.


	24. Chapter 24 Sinful Articulation

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 24 Sinful Articulation

Lily continued to spend her time sitting next to Severus as they both recovered. The worst of it was over, or so the healers said. Lily's blisters were bursting open and drying out, but there was a couple remedies available that should reduce any scarring. No 100% guarantee, however the marks that did result should fade over time. The healing potions had to be on the mild side, unless the patient was willing to suffer noticeable lasting pockmarks, if healing was performed too quickly without taking the intermediate precautionary steps. Lily felt it was all a load of tosh. This was magic wasn't it?

Severus was taking longer to clear up. There was still material periodically being removed from his throat, mouth and nose, and his eyes were still closed as those pustules were still openly oozing that dried into flaky crust. Salve was frequently applied to protect his eyes, along with another greasy substance that was used over the rest of his body. Steadily, Lily had been seeing more green become exposed, but the skin had a pitted appearance. It was only a stage of recovery, but she was worried about the extent of his scarring.

He was awake for short periods during the day. Lily would hold his hand and read class notes aloud for courses they had in common. No more than once a day, she'd give him a brief kiss. Severus didn't object, even if he could only do it silently. It had been just over three weeks since she had heard her friend's voice. She missed it, even if those who insulted him said it was whiny and snivelly. His voice could be different due to scarring in his throat, and there was still the question of whether his eyesight was affected. For now, she settled for him being alive.

****************************

Abraxas Malfoy was alive and well, and despite his superior breeding and manners, he was pissed.

The third Malfoy house elf in as many weeks had dropped dead. His wife's favorite had the ill grace to expire in front of her within her boudoir about ten minutes ago. The continued caterwauling drove Abraxas out of his own bedroom and down to the library with its layers of silencing spells.

Lucius was in there dealing with all his mama's blubbering. If there was one thing that made his son weak, it was his unnatural attachment to his mother, who was only a Malfoy by marriage. When she wanted something of him, her son would knock on the gates of hell itself to get it for her.

While he was in the library, Abraxas decided to do some research with the month's batch of offers to become his son's wife. Although that would cut the cord, Lucius was still a Malfoy and couldn't just be thrown to any witch from a respectable family. Additionally, Abraxas still had plenty more years of life to enjoy, and he didn't want to have to be burdened with the company of just anyone when Lucius stopped round later.

Greengrass could offer a whole room full of galleons, this lass was too plain looking to birth the next Malfoy. Abraxas didn't bother researching her family, and just threw that letter aside to write a tactful rejection.

Some frenchie had written about his half-veela daughter. Her photograph was what he would expect with that parentage. Abraxas cringed at the foreign part, but her generous dowry included two house elves. It might warrant an introduction. If Lucius was too weak-willed to her charms, that would be the end of it.

And the last of this month's candidates was Miss Narcissa Black. Her older sister, Bellatrix, was quite the spectacle at times. Considering she married Rabastan Lestrange, quite a coup for the Blacks, she should be spending her time performing her primary duty and whelping the next Lestrange. Her sister could be just as irresponsible. There was another sister, Andromeda … married a mudblood. Black was going to have to come up with a lot more gold for Abraxas to even consider this proposal.

Why was this being so difficult? Where were the beautiful witches from good British families that loved their daughters enough to make an offer backed with the wealth worthy of both their houses?

Abraxas was idly flipping through the self-updating tome when something outside the library caused the ground floor of Malfoy Manor to vibrate. Riddle and his followers … killing his house elves, and now causing a disturbance in his home by upsetting his wife. He had been willing to stand aside when first approached, the group had a worthy goal, but the methods and who would lead were simply offensive. A Malfoy is a valued ally, not a follower. Who was this Riddle anyway? Riddle was not a wizarding name, and the listing of his parents in the directory was of no help because Abraxas had never recalled meeting either one in society. No worries, that's what a Malfoy had well-paid lackeys to do – find out who Tom Riddle is and where he came from. Public knowledge of where this supposed friend of purebloods came from might get him distracted long enough for Abraxas to swoop in and exact some revenge. Certainly not today, or even this week, but he had waited for years to extract his satisfaction before, and that was when it was sweetest, when the enemy did not even know it was coming.

****************************

Lily felt her appearance was getting closer to presentable. She was green, and there was a spatter of pockmarks on her face, but not as bad as the front of her right thigh. Lily was positive she had not scratched there. Willing to trust Healer Pye and Healer Spleen, the marks would fade over time, and maybe even disappear. The loo wasn't so big, but when she stepped back from the mirror, the ones on her face weren't as noticeable when she backed up to the far wall.

Contrary to common sense, Lily wished her healing blisters would slow down. Severus was now awake much of the day, his eyes were open and he haltingly talked. His eyes looked fine, but there were now medicated eye drops to work on eradicating the blurriness caused by residual problems from his corneal blisters. Severus' voice sounded deeper to Lily and for now, he couldn't speak at length without starting to cough on remaining materials that loosened in his throat as he talked.

They had worked out a system to do their work together peacefully. Lily wheeled her table over to Sev's bed, and they put them side by side to have plenty of room, while they sat together and worked on each subject with Lily reading aloud till Severus' eyes got better. He could still write fairly well, but couldn't read it back. It worked fine until whoever on the right got tired of getting jostled, and then they'd switch sides, with Lily getting up while Sev slid over. It would be ideal if one of them was left-handed.

There were still breaks in between while Severus got assistance and medicated from healers. Lily offered to help to hurry things up so they could get back to working, but the only thing Sev would accept help with from her was brushing his teeth, since he still wasn't allowed up to use the loo. Naughty scamp!

Some of their professors were going easy on them, and others just offered to catch them up once they returned. Lily was happy she didn't need to read any Arithmancy or Ancient Runes to Severus, since she'd probably make a total hash of it, especially if she had to describe any weird characters from some foreign alphabet. Prof. Kettleburn just asked her to read the textbook.

For Divination, Lily had to explain a recent dream and interpret it. They covered dreams in earlier years, why revisit it? Being in St. Mungo's sick with dragonpox was not conducive to happy dreams. Lily dreamed about Severus a lot. Either dead, dying, her not being able to help him, his not recovering from some aspect of his nastiest case ever, and an overwhelming sense of loss if any of this came true.

She tried to get Severus to tell her one of his dreams, but he claimed not to remember any since he was still knocked out each night on sleeping potions. Lily even tried to get him to share by confessing she dreamed that James Potter flew off his card, put her on the back of her broom, and then she was stuck on the card with him while no one could find her anywhere, and not a single person looked at the card to see her on the back of Potter's broom. He was amused. When Lily had first shown him that card, he meant to laugh, but ending up choking for over a minute. That didn't diminish her friend's sense of humor since he played around with Black's card when Lily said the dog must be the person that loved Black most. When Sev had shook his head 'no', Lily guessed at others, and repeated Pettigrew multiple times, till he told her that Sirius Black loved Sirius Black most. She found it a little funny, but it was kind of sad that in her eyes, Sirius Black really was that conceited.

"So you still aren't going to help me, and let me write about your dreams instead of being swept off by Potter, Sev?"

He inclined his head, then called her, "Mrs. Toerag."

No surprise since that was Lily's favorite name for Potter, but the honorific reminded Lily of another bad dream here that she had wanted to forget. It was all Petunia's fault … however, it was sure to be in her dream text, Lily thought as she jumped off the foot of Sev's bed, where she had been sitting while talking to him, and dashed over to her trunk. This sounded good, Lily thought, as she read the interpretation.

Not that Severus was the least bit interested in her Divination homework, but he was sitting across the room waiting for some explanation for why she just left him after what he thought was the mildest of insults. Lily made a face. If she told him about the dream without explanation, it would sound really weird. Fortunately, it involved something she had been meaning to talk to him about. She still hadn't told Sev about her fight with Petunia. Lily had meant to, but had forgotten. All her letters to her sister went unanswered, and her mother didn't comment on it. With a sigh, she got her stuff together, and headed back over with the pillow from her bed and the bed next to hers.

Lily positioned the two pillows so she could comfortably lounge at the foot of his bed, while looking at Severus. She even pulled the blankets out from the bottom, so she could put her feet and legs under the covers outside his. Happy that Lily returned, Severus patted her feet fondly where they rested next to his thighs now.

"Do you remember how I told you before we got on the train that I had a fight with Petunia, Sev?"

Severus did not care for Petunia, but knowing Lily for years, he knew that Lily loved her sister no matter what. If Petunia was important to Lily, then Petunia had to be important to him too. He gave a slight nod, urging her to continue, in spite of the way he really felt.

Drawing a deep breath, Lily just said it. "Petunia said you are going to get me pregnant."

His face scrunched in painful thought, and then he asked, "Now? Or after we're married?"

"We don't have to be married, Sev." He rolled his eyes at her. "And no, Petunia meant now with me coming home from school crying to my parents."

His eyes narrowed because it seemed odd to him that Lily would think this was even a possibility. If she thought babies came from kissing, why did she start kissing him? Severus intentionally cleared his throat so he could attempt an entire sentence without interruption. "Kissing does not cause pregnancy."

"I know that, Sev," Lily responded in annoyance.

"Why was ..." Severus grimaced through a cough, then continued, "... there a fight then?"

"Petunia was accusing me of horrible things, and it really hurt." Severus rubbed one of Lily's feet, and she continued, "It hurt. I don't know if it hurt more because Petunia could think such things of me, or the way she said them."

"Could she ..." Severus stopped for a moment, made a bit of noise in his throat, then continued, "have a fake fight to get rid of you?"

Lily knew Severus had to conserve his words, but didn't understand. "Fake a fight?"

"Be unreasonable so you don't try."

"Try what?"

After a coughing sigh, he said, "You want to be sisters with Petunia."

"We'll always be sisters," Lily replied, wondering if she should give Sev a piece of parchment.

"Close sisters. You want. She doesn't?"

"She wouldn't need to make something up, Sev. There's always magic to fight about. You know how she doesn't like how I'm different."

"Not working." After a noticeable shaking indrawn breath, he added, "You keep coming back."

Lily didn't think Severus would be so mature and insightful if he knew how Petunia referred to him, and to them together. "So she picks a fight with me over something so insane that I will think our love is beyond salvaging?"

He nodded.

"Maybe. Nothing started the fight. You were asleep, mum was in the bath, and it all poured out of her mouth."

Shrugging, Severus suggested with a finger pointing to his own chest, "I write Tuney?"

Lily replied, "No. She said I was lying about us, and would think anything you said or wrote a lie too."

Good, he thought. He didn't want to write Petunia Evans, but if he offered, Lily would know he supported her in this worthless cause.

"That's why this must have been in my mind when I dreamed someone secretly slipped me a potion that got me pregnant."

Severus immediately made a face of disgust.

Lily pulled out the booklet, and insisted, "Really. It's in this." She leaned forward to give Severus the book.

"I know. Ingredients," he replied, and then stuck out his tongue.

"That's not in here."

Severus took the large pamphlet, since she was stubbornly leaning on his legs. "Male seed. Egg too unless …" he grunted, then finished, "you are other parent." Looking at the cover of a brochure that claimed to be all about conceiving a child, he asked, "Why have this?"

Lily couldn't wait till Severus was back to being his eloquent self. Well, maybe on some other subject than making babies. She shrugged nonchalantly and said, "I only knew the muggle way."

He didn't open the literature, but held it out for her to take back, and asked, "Us?"

His one track mind involving them made it difficult to have general conversations, chafed Lily as she thought of what to say in return with more grace than she turned down his first marriage proposal. Not that this was a proposal, but with Sev limited to how many words he could get out, this might be as close as it got.

"I overheard Healer Pye, but I didn't want to get her in trouble so I asked for all sorts of things."

"Pye?"

"About all the pain you were in," Lily looked purposely at his covered lap. "I didn't know the terms she was using."

He frowned at her.

"You're still on pain potion, Sev."

Not wanting to discuss it, Severus remained quiet.

Leaning forward, Lily asked, "Can you show me?"

"Not appropriate."

"Why not? I know you're green. So am I."

He shook his head 'no' as he roughly cleared his throat.

"Sev, I saw it all when Black vanished all your clothes. And you did urinate in front of me."

"Angry at you. Covered then."

"Please."

"Mine. Till married."

Lily grimaced. Had her mum and dad gotten to Sev? "Just to look. How do I know I want it?"

"Saw it all," he replied with a raised eyebrow.

"Maybe I want to see it because I think about it all the time."

Severus looked horrified.

"Just kidding," Lily said exasperatedly. She kicked him in the leg to emphasize her joking when he continued to give her a dirty look.

He got a serious look and pointed at the baby booklet, "After married. With proper house."

It was Lily's turn to frown as she gathered up her materials in frustration at Sev's stubbornness. She could write about her dream later after dinner once Sev was fed, cleaned and put to sleep.

****************************

Prof. Abstractus finally found a Potions Master that was willing to look at some of his student's work. He had tracked this fellow's name down through a friend of a friend as a Master who was not set in his ways, like so many of them were.

Arithmancy was more fluid then Potions, where many thought if it was not a recipe cited in a text over a century old then it was rubbish. That was Slughorn's argument to Dumbledore, when Abstractus tried to go over his head. Any substitutions were worthless because there were already valid recipes. Most of Snape's work was eliminating the need for animal parts and hard-to-come-by plants.

The length of time for the correspondence to travel to this Yank in the Americas would mean this would be slow going, if Abstractus' suspicions were right and these calculations would actually produce favorable results. He still needed to talk to Snape about publishing rights, since this fellow wanted to share credit for doing the hands-on experimentation as long as common, inexpensive ingredients were used so he did not incur an unreasonable expense.

****************************

Lily stayed up late with her Divination. She was still aggravated with Severus so doubted she could sleep. After allowing him one ale with lunch and dinner once he started eating solids again, Lily was sure he would reciprocate, but then turned down her simple request. After the busy book-reader did one of her nightly checks on him, Lily would go peek at it anyway.

This dream, while disturbing, was actually ideal for interpretation, especially since it could apply to different areas of her life. The pregnancy symbolized an aspect of her personal life that was developing or growing. It could also mean a new direction or goal. Returning to Hogwart's after suffering from dragonpox would certainly have changes occur in her life. Lily would be green and unattractive. That led to the potion being in the dream. That indicated negative results or misfortune, and the text advised heavily against trying to alter this outcome. Since the only way she could think of avoiding Hogwart's was to spend the rest of the year sequestered in her bedroom at home, obviously it would be inadvisable. Besides, Lily was a Gryffindor. She was brave enough to take whatever her fellow students could dish out.

Lily was midway through her clean copy of the assignment when her least favorite healer arrived to check on Severus. She hoped they would start giving him a lesser sleeping potion soon. He was so dead to the world on this one that he didn't wake for eye drops, getting gunk cleaned out of his respiratory track, or for the application of the oily potion to his entire body behind that closed curtain.

When the healer left to return to her book, Lily took another minute to finish her essay and put everything away first, before sticking her head out the door to scope out the healer was where she expected before sneaking over to Severus.

His snoring was back to its regular volume so she'd have some warning of him waking. Lily folded the covers down tidily so she could get everything back in place. She frowned as she viewed his pajama trousers. Was that it? Although Sev was in bed all day, she had not noticed this big lump before. Were these trousers a smaller size? Hers were quite loose.

Nervously listening for footsteps in the corridor, or for Sev's snoring to stop, Lily untied the waist and loosened the drawstring. Swallowing hard, she pulled the fabric downwards. It was no flobberworm, and was thicker than a wand. She was mesmerized as it rose up once it was no longer confined. She wouldn't have stopped, but his trousers would go no lower unless Lily raised his bum off the bed.

Normally, it would not be green, but it still didn't look like the illustration. Wasn't this pointed in the wrong direction? Hesitantly, Lily put her hand on it to push it the right way. The just applied potion's oiliness did not disguise the fleshy surface overlaying a hard core, resisting Lily's guidance. Considering Severus was on both sleeping and pain medication, Lily attempted to force it because it was in entirely the incorrect position to allow her to get his trousers back up. It did not cooperate, being as stubborn as the rest of the body to which it was attached.

The snoring stopped and Lily looked at Sev's face, afraid she was about to be caught. His eyes remained closed while he inhaled deeply, and after a long exhale, clearly said, "Lily," in that new deeper voice.

Lily held her breath while waiting for Severus to either burst out laughing or start yelling. Nothing changed about his face, but she was surprised when she felt it twitch in her hand. Was it supposed to do that? While staring back down at that, his snoring began again. Not ready to find out what else this was capable of on its own, Lily did her best to pull the trousers back up while pressing it against his abdomen in order to get the trousers' waist to the reach the correct place. Let him figure out why it was facing this way when he woke up.

****************************

Lily was tired when she arose. She had spent too much time thinking about what should have been a quick peek to keep her curiosity satisfied. It didn't look like the book. Was Sev keeping it hidden from her because he knew it was different? It was a relief that he thought he was capable of fathering children, and that he would want a house first, rather than getting by on just five galleons. In June, some made rude comments about it comparing it to his house's animal, but if it was truly unusual, at the very least, Lily could always count on the Marauders to say something. They wouldn't allow any chance to mock Sev to pass.

She removed the ale from his breakfast tray, and stashed them in the bedside table for the bed next to his. Her original hiding place was full.

Helen's letter was more of the same. Potter and Quidditch, and Helen made Pettigrew and Black sound like they were on a crusade. The first match was Gryffindor versus Slytherin in a couple weeks. She had mentioned it before, surely to amuse Lily, but continued her update regarding the battle of the sexes within Gryffindor. There was now a neutral area at their table in the Great Hall to allow dating couples to dine together. Things at Hogwart's must be boring if Mary and Helen had to make up such juvenile tales to tell her.

Lily also received a wrapped tupperware from her mother late in the morning, after Sev was up and they were finishing their current assignments. Although they were not made by Petunia, these sandwiches were made by Lily's mother who taught Petunia how to slice bread and cucumbers that thin. There was also a note of apology that the bread may have become damp since Mrs. Evans was putting them together in advance for shipping. No egg sandwiches due to mayonnaise possibly going off.

Since she could cast a freshness charm to keep them till later, Lily asked, "Would you like tea this afternoon, Sev? My mother sent sandwiches."

A light shone in Severus' eyes, but he calmly responded, "When you want. Won't drink their tea."

Making a face, Lily cast the charm. He could wait then. She put the container on top of her trunk after she stored her completed work and texts. She suggested more parchment and pen word games, now that Sev sometimes forgot the letters between games and couldn't see well enough to be reminded. It helped when Lily kept talking non-stop about anything but the game while playing.

At lunchtime, Severus asked, "Save second ale for later?"

Lily nodded. Ale and cucumber sandwiches? Ugh. If the sandwiches weren't a special treat for Sev, definitely not. She had tasted one of his second bottles, and if this was sweeter, Lily did not want to try the regular version.

They spent the afternoon, in between healer visits, like most of their summer holiday. Talking about nothing in particular and looking into the other's eyes. Sev said he could see the green of Lily's clear enough, against the different shade of her skin. Lily even spent some time listening to his chest, as she did when he was unconscious, but now she was looking towards his face, rather than the foot of the bed. He also rested his hand on her shoulder.

When tea was brought round by St. Mungo's, Lily went to retrieve the sandwiches to share with Severus. Unlike the boys of Gryffindor, her friend was able to appreciate restraint which was absolutely necessary when dining on light food such as this. Some oaf could probably inhale the entire lot in minutes.

Lily opened the container and placed it on his table and then set about fixing her tea. Rather than grabbing one, Severus took time to admire these sandwiches, even if they were not presented ideally, carefully arranged on a plate. Once Lily was seated next to him with her tea and took her own sandwich, he selected the one on top nearest to him. When Severus took his first bite, he found it to be absolutely perfect.

Her friend was a nutter. Severus was trembling slightly as he ate, and closed his eyes in worship of her mother's simple sandwich of white bread, cucumber and butter with a dash of lemon juice and salt. He better not be proposing marriage under the delusion that Lily would be bothered slaving over getting cucumbers sliced so thinly that he could read The Daily Prophet through them.

He enjoyed the sandwiches immensely, and didn't bother opening his saved ale till after he and Lily had devoured every bite. While he sipped it, Severus reminded Lily that they had not written letters yet today. She was surprised at Sev. Usually she had to force him to write someone … anyone.

After finishing her correspondence, Lily was disappointed to find that Severus had tricked her when he handed her a note already sealed addressed to her mother. "What are you writing about to my mum?"

"Thank you," he replied with an annoyed shrug. What would Lily think he was writing to her mother?

Lily didn't trust Severus. What if it contained some nonsense about marriage and children? What if it contained details about the seriousness of dragonpox that Lily neglected to tell her mum? It was light, one sheet probably. She could always claim that Severus came down with fever and delusions while in hospital.

****************************

Madam Pomfrey frowned at the letter from Healer Agnes Pye. She was perfectly capable of follow-up care for students recovering from dragonpox. This healer obviously did not understand how many doses of the dragonpox cure that she had to schedule and administer to the entire school. That's the only reason that Miss Evans was at St. Mungo's. She may have sent Mr. Snape there anyway because she didn't have time to deal with requests for pillow fluffing every time she turned her back.

Either the two patients would floo to St. Mungo's weekly till declared completely cured, or this healer or one of her colleagues would examine the patients here in the Hogwart's Infirmary, Pomfrey's exclusive domain.

She did not care for the thinly veiled sarcasm in the notification. Pomfrey did not know how that nasty boy, Severus Snape, hoodwinked them at St. Mungo's, but she had the worth of him. Not a week passed without one of those poor Gryffindor lads coming to see her when that sneaky bit of filth hexed them. This September had been injury free for both helpless Peter Pettigrew and gentle Remus Lupin.

****************************

As Severus' health improved, Lily started feigning unwellness to avoid being separated from him. She was doing well keeping up with her schoolwork, and although Sev could now see large letters without difficulty, she didn't want to leave him here with a magnifying glass and bottles of ale for company. The healers weren't fooled, but they could allow some leeway since it would be easier to return to school with a second green student, rather than going alone.

Prof. Slughorn finally sent them assignments. Lily rolled her eyes at the absurdity of them, but the joke was on him since she had access to the healers' library here at the hospital, and got permission to return books to their hospital room since Severus was still not allowed out of bed.

At first, Lily thought she was just bringing the wrong books back. There was a match on the ingredients or potions, but the answers to the specific questions wasn't in their text or any of these books. She grew more frustrated as Severus said it was fine, and kept working through the potions' assignments. He shared information with her and walked her through connections that she never heard of or read. He was not smug, and just stated the properties and resulting combination with procedure as matter of fact. His suggestion that Slughorn assigned these questions to intentionally score them low was not a balm, Lily felt she should be just as able to cope with this as Severus.

During Severus' mid-afternoon break for drops, medicine and assistance, Lily spent thirty minutes of torment not producing more than two words about the side effects of Babbling Beverage, other than the drinker spouting nonsense.

To test her theory about this worthless potion, she asked Healer Spleen as he opened Sev's curtain. He replied, "Who the heck cares about Babbling Beverage? The ingredients are too costly to make it for fun."

Lily raised her eyebrow. Spleen had fun? Maybe he was also having fun by not actually answering the question, she thought as she angrily threw her quill down.

Severus said, "We don't have to work on this today, Lily."

Holding her hands out, she replied, "We're not even a third of the way done with what Prof. Slughorn asked us to do."

He shrugged, commenting, "Say you were too sick to do it."

"That's lying."

Rather than responding, Severus cleared his throat slightly.

"Maybe I'm rubbish at this. You're answering all these for me."

"That's not true. Once I explain, you understand," he said, then choked out, "Not copying."

Lily got up and went over to Severus' bed. Doubting she was going to stay over here long, she sat in the middle and held his hand, rather than disturbing him completely by having him scoot over to slide in next to him.

"I wouldn't be able to answer these without you."

"You'd manage, Lily."

"Right, when Slughorn takes your work and accidentally erases your name, and writes Lily Evans on them for me."

"You scored Outstanding on your own."

"I did, but now it feels like I know nothing."

Severus sighed, then muttered, "Don't let Slughorn do this. We'll be back in regular class soon enough."

"At NEWT level, we need to brew individually. It's hardly any partner work."

Indignantly, he reminded her, "You can brew."

"But you won't be helping me. What if I blow the whole lab up?"

"That'll show Slughorn not to get you angry."

"I'm not kidding, Sev. Maybe what they say about Muggleborns is true. I might have gone as far as I can."

Exasperated, he flung out his free hand and asked, "What about all the other work we've been doing?"

"That's all easy because those professors are just giving us something to take our minds off things while we're in hospital. Slughorn's could be what we really should know."

Rolling his eyes, Severus said, "No. Whoever is in NEWT level was in our class last year. They," he stopped for a moment, looked uncomfortable, then continued, "are not any smarter now."

Letting her misery show on her face, Lily confessed, "It's not them that matters, Sev. It's you. When everyone realizes how brilliant you are, and that I've been getting by with your help, where does that leave me?"

"You are talking nonsense, Lily."

"I'm not. I'll be your … your … your Pettigrew."

Disgusted by the comparison, he reminded her, "You are not a mindless follower, Lily."

"Only because you humor me, Sev. You'd have lots of friends if it wasn't for me. I know the Slytherins think you are flawed because of your friendship with me."

"I don't need anyone else, Lily."

"Why would you choose one person, over a whole house that is supposed to be your 'real friends'?"

After a moment's consideration, Severus said, "Firmissima est inter parēs amīcitia."

An unexpected tingle ran through Lily's body. When Severus spoke Latin with this deeper, sometimes silky voice, it was magical.

"It's 'friendship is always firmest among equals'. If I admitted you were rubbish, then I'd be admitting the same about myself."

Sev's admission saddened Lily. People called her best friend worthless trash all the time. His father, Petunia, Hogwart's staff and students for years made no secret of how they felt about him, and said it proudly and loudly for all to hear. The volume was sure to increase with the remaining amount of pockmarks just on his face alone.

Lily threw her arms around Severus, shifting bodily to get closer to him. Although she had given him a kiss earlier, she kissed him a second time today, holding it for longer than their token daily liplock.

****************************

Prof. McGonagall volunteered to pick up the two students from St. Mungo's. She had visited frequently enough to know that Mr. Snape's dragonpox had been critical, and that he still had lingering infirmities that went beyond the visible green skin with pockmarks. However, if he and Miss Evans did not return to school now, they might be forced to wait until next September to start their sixth year.

She collected their work that they completed during their stay in the hospital. It was simpler to deliver it for her, rather than have them lug around what turned out to be even greater in volume then their holiday assignments. McGonagall frowned at the excessive amount some of her colleagues assigned.

Once she had the students back at Hogwart's, gave them their schedules and allowed them to return to their dormitories for the evening, she kept an after-dinner appointment that she had arranged with four members of Gryffindor.

Prof. McGonagall offered the four Marauders tea and ginger newts. This was intended to be a friendly and informational meeting.

"Gentlemen, congratulations on making it through one month of probation. There's been complaints regarding your opinion of the Gryffindor quidditch team, but everyone is entitled to an opinion if they are able to express themselves civilly," she said, giving them a knowing look.

Having already expressed their opinion loudly and clearly to their head of house, the boys chose to accept this with some grace, and remained silent. McGonagall didn't ask them here to talk about quidditch because she responded publicly to their complaints already.

"Your classmate, Miss Evans, has returned to the castle and will be attending classes starting tomorrow."

Although all looked pleased, James Potter enthusiastically volunteered, "I can walk her to all her classes and carry her books, Professor. It would be my pleasure."

Unable to contain themselves, the other Marauders laughed openly at Prongs' eager puppy dog act.

"I'm sure she'd appreciate the offer, Potter. She's in good health, and may not need much assistance. I also would not want you to be late to any of your classes, if hers are in the opposite direction."

Sirius thoughtfully added, "That might be why Slughorn moved all our seats around. I thought he was just being a pisshead breaking us apart, Prongs, but Evans could be in that empty corner seat next to you."

"Mr. Black," McGonagall said warningly.

"Of course," Potter exclaimed with a beaming smile. "After missing a month and with the holiday, Evans is sure to need a little help. And here we were thinking the worst of old Sluggy."

McGonagall continued, "Mr. Snape is also returned." Before they could interrupt, she held her hands out and said, "Now, I know you have not done anything wrong _at school_ and wish you to continue to behave yourselves. You might feel the need to cheer up your classmate since he had a particularly nasty case of dragonpox, and if you do I am merely asking that you keep it mild. _If _you cannot control yourselves."

The Marauders all spoke at once denying any of them possibly starting some sort of altercation. Snape always started it by attacking them.

Raising her voice, McGonagall said, "Nevertheless, gentlemen, I only wanted to have a word with you because you may not realize how ill he was, and how unwell he still is. I don't want to tempt you in any way by listing his current infirmities, but I want you aware that your actions may have a more serious result than you intended. That would be unfortunate for both him and all of you. Do we have an understanding?"

They agreed, but were full of incredulity as they walked back to Gryffindor tower. Potter was trying to hurry them along to see Evans, but he did stay with them as they discussed McGonagall.

"You think we were filthy Slytherins the way she talked to us," Sirius complained. "Since when have we ever attacked someone who had their back turned or while they were down?"

Remus scratched his head, and answered, "You do it all the time, Padfoot. You got a Hufflepuff at a urinal two days ago."

Peter defended that action, "He should have finished up and gotten out when we came in. Stupid shirt lifter hanging out in there, waiting to watch."

James didn't want to waste any time over Snape, and commented, "We know we won't, and now we know that McGonagall is watching us closely. If Snivelly keeps his greasy nose out of our business, then we'll let him pass."

"It's a great, big, green, greasy nose now, Prongs," Peter said with a laugh.

"Oh Merlin!" Sirius exclaimed in realization and laughed too. With any luck, Snivelly would hide out in the dungeons till he returned to merely being a greasy git.

AN: Even though she's not in this fic, I think Aurora Sinistra has a high probability to be left-handed since _sinestra_ is Latin for left, besides the root for sinister. In the first movie, Rickman writes with his right hand. And yes, the Rickman voice has now made its entrance.


	25. Chapter 25 Who's Green and Who's Mean?

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 25 Who's Green and Who's Mean?

James was disappointed when they returned to Gryffindor tower. The silly girls, still not talking to the boys, especially the Marauders, had whisked Lily Evans up the stairs into the privacy of the girls' dormitories.

Rumor was that Evans was green and spotty with pockmarks. He'd wait to see for himself, and even if it was too much, she'd get better and then maybe by spring, Plan: J.P. + L.E. would be back on.

In the meantime, he could be friendly to her, so when he asked her on a date, she wouldn't just call him a toerag, and march in the opposite direction with her nose stuck in the air.

James was totally unprepared for Evans' return tonight anyway. He still had rolls of parchment to fill with homework due tomorrow. He knew she'd be in Potions first thing tomorrow. Sluggy had been a bit shirty at the beginning of the school year about Snape and Evans having dragonpox and trying to kill them all. Suppose at his advanced age that was always a possibility. They looked fine on the train, so it was likely James would have done the same thing and came to school himself. Couldn't blame Evans for that.

Poor Moony had Ancient Runes tomorrow, so was stuck with Sirius and him hitting the books. Well, Padfoot's books were open, but he wasn't too worried about getting anything on his parchment right now. Wormtail was retelling another chapter of the Marauders' oral history to young male Gryffindors, and Sirius was more than willing to assist.

"I should get up early tomorrow in case Evans needs someone to walk her down to breakfast."

Remus smiled at him, and said, "I heard she's capable of walking, but it's not a bad idea … if she's not surrounded by the amazons."

"Why Prongs? We'll see her in Potions soon enough. Now that Sluggy's set it up for you to sit next to her and help her out, you'll see all you need to, close up and personal."

"We don't all have to get up early to, do we?" Peter asked. He didn't have a class first thing tomorrow.

Sirius smirked and said, "Safety in numbers. If Evans has joined the ladies, Prongs will need back up."

James shuddered and said, "Luckily those two don't have Potions, so I'll be able to talk to Evans on her own."

"If only someone would cast that jinx without us around," Remus complained. He was tired of the lack of progress finding the perpetrator of the Breast Baring Jinx, and was starting to agree that maybe the perv had graduated. Maybe they should look into who was a 7th last year, boys only of course, and try to inquire if the jinx had moved on to any of their new locations. In addition to the injustice of someone letting them take the blame, he was fed up with the Gryffindor girls unfairly treating them like scum. Not that he'd treat Evans unwell, but if the four of them made an effort to be sensitive and helpful to her, she was someone who wouldn't be afraid to break from the pack and treat them like people.

************************

Lily could not believe how immature the Gryffindors were acting. The females were really ignoring the males? For the most part, that is. Seemed there were some Gryffindors just so bold that they didn't care about the open war raging about them, and muddled through it to selectively fraternize with the enemy.

Helen and Mary were still socializing with Malcolm and Evan, but were not completely happy with the Slytherins. Those two boys were still talking to other girls from Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff, and would invite them to their table in the library under the pretense of doing schoolwork. If they made it a point to show up with Lily, and Lily could bring Severus, then there would be no empty seats left for other girls. They were sure that they'd let Snape join them because they had been complaining about his lack of homework assistance while he was hospitalized. Helen and Mary could not impress them on some subjects because who in their right mind would take Arithmancy? And neither got the E needed to continue Potions.

Although Lily would be happy to aid her friends and this plan was not as crazy as some they came up with, she was bothered. Both her roommates seemed serious about dating and also about seeing someone exclusively, rather than for just fun. They were talking about the Slytherins like they were commodities, to acquire and then to trade up from, if the opportunity presented itself to reach the goal of attaining a husband. Certainly they enjoyed their company, but marriage? They were only sixteen, and although wizarding Britain was small, they were sure to meet plenty of other wizards once they graduated from school.

This weekend was quidditch, and the following weekend was Hogsmeade. The plan was to get the Malcolm and Evan to commit to escort them to Hogsmeade, not just set up a rendezvous place and time like younger students did.

One thing was certain though, Helen was not going to go easy on Slytherin this weekend in quidditch. She saw no conflict of interest because the only sixth year Slytherin on the team was Mulciber, and she desired nothing more than to use his own beater bat to make it impossible for him to sit on a broom. Barring that, she'd settle for thrashing him and the rest of the Slytherin team on the pitch.

************************

James Potter was waiting in the common room with both Remus Lupin, reading a book, and Sirius Black, dozing to catch up on his beauty sleep. He had roused his friends early to make sure they went to breakfast at the same time as the sixth year ladies, and had even prepared by bringing a white hand towel to use as a flag of truce.

Peter Pettigrew was given the opportunity, but James decided not to press him when he muttered some unkind things regarding spotty green frogs while trying to pull the covers over his head.

After a couple of false alarms as other Gryffindors descended the ladies' staircase, the three sixth years made their appearance. Nudging Sirius first, James stood, and approached them waving the towel, and charmingly declared, "Truce. Truce, ladies?"

"Give it a break, Potter," Helen replied.

"Aw, come on," he pleaded winningly. "Wanted to welcome Evans back. I'll even carry her books to breakfast and Potions. Please."

Mary made a face at Potter, and said to her friends, "Come on. We don't have time for whatever these losers want."

Sirius blocked the exit, the back side of the Fat Lady's portrait. With a smile, he said, "I'll carry your books, MacDonald."

"I don't want them thrown off the seventh floor balcony, Black," she replied dismissively.

Lily crossed her arms over her chest. First day back, and Potter and Black were already being annoying toerags.

"At least let us walk you down to the Great Hall," Remus suggested. "We're going to breakfast too."

Helen said, "I suppose, but don't try anything."

"Us?" James replied innocently, while trying not to stare at Evans. She was green, really green.

"Uh, Evans," Sirius started. "We have Potions too, if you'd like us to try to catch you up a bit at breakfast."

Thawing slightly, Lily replied as they went down the stairs, "Prof. Slughorn did send some assignments to us in the hospital."

James added, "We also have Charms, Transfiguration, Defense and Magical Creatures together. Prof. Kettleburn's suspended again, so we can wait till this weekend to go over that."

"Yeah," Sirius agreed. He could easily let Prongs sit next to Evans, if he was serious about continuing with this mad plan.

"I have Herbology with you," Remus added.

"Maybe," Lily replied.

"Don't you think it fate that you are in all five of my classes with me, Evans?" James asked with an expectant air.

"Leave off, Potter. It's bad enough she came down with dragonpox. Don't need to remind her she's cursed with you for two more years," Helen growled.

"At least Evans is smart enough to get into more than Divination, Parkin," Sirius teased.

"We are taking five courses, Black," Mary corrected him.

Sirius smirked. They were in Charms because they only wanted to do girly stuff with them, and they were in Defense with them because the whole class had been a joke for years.

Seeing the ladies travel to the amazon section of the Gryffindor table for breakfast, the gentlemen were brave and followed them into no-man's land, ignoring the glares of those already seated.

James cockily reminded them, "We said we'd go over a bit of Potions with Evans over breakfast."

"If you start spitting food or any other grotty thing, there won't be enough of you left to scrape off the stone floor to take up to the Infirmary."

"If it's one thing a Black is known for, it's his impeccable table manners," Sirius said smugly as he took a seat across from Parkin, leaving the spot opposite the pockmarked Evans clear for James.

Nevertheless, the gentlemen restrained their natural impulses and behaved like they were having tea with their grans during breakfast. James kept reminding himself that Evans' pockmarks while deep now, would fade over time. Her solid green also served to keep him from eating too heavy. With her red hair, the effect was very unattractive. The only good thing was, no other boy would try to turn her head while James waited for her.

When it came time to talk Potions, Remus took the opportunity to speak to Helen and Mary of other things since the three of them did not have the subject at NEWT level.

Lily's questions confused James and Sirius because she was asking about things they had not covered in class, in addition to not being in the text. She became distracted as she looked over to the far side of the Great Hall and muttered, "Now what?"

They turned to see behind them, and recognized Severus Snape by his overwhelming greenness entering the Great Hall on the Slytherin side of the room. He was slumped with his usual poor posture and his long, lanky hair was hanging over his scowling face. A gaggle of younger Slytherins were flitting about him, while he ignored them, including Regulus Black.

Very few had paid the younger Black any attention when he spread the word to his housemates over the holiday that Severus Snape was someone to keep an eye on, even though he was only an inferior half-blood. Snape was all but forgotten once he was removed to St. Mungo's. Within one day of returning, the biggest remaining physical bully of Slytherin, Mulciber, had a black eye and from rumors, Snape was the cause.

Severus was surrounded by idiots. They should all take themselves over to the Hufflepuff table, and join them in a group hug. If one of these miscreants tried to touch him again, a black eye would be the least of their problems. Respecting Rosier's and Wilkes' neutrality last night during the altercation in their room, he walked past them with none of the three offering a greeting. He chose an empty section of the table, which did not stay deserted long as the younger Slytherins fluttered into seats around him.

The three Marauders at breakfast were puzzled. No one admired Severus Snape, and dragonpox was not so rare that he should be an object of curiosity. Slytherins had an queer sense of humor, so it was sure to be some sort of house prank. Snape may be an oddball, but it was rather cruel to lay into him less than a day after he returned from St. Mungo's. Still he brought it upon himself.

Rather than letting Snape sidetrack his plan, James Potter pressed on about Potions with Lily Evans. He took control of what they were covering by showing her what point they had reached in the book and what was scheduled to be brewed this morning so she'd know in advance.

Lily had already read through the textbook past this point. Severus was right, Slughorn had sent them assignments to purposely trip them up. Even though Sev shrugged it off because he said only the NEWT grade counted, Lily could not be as forgiving.

She couldn't see through the throng around Severus, but he was probably eating something, or he wouldn't have bothered coming to the Great Hall. When he rose, Lily excused herself to join him. If those children were bothering him, she could at least use her influence as a prefect to help him out without jinxing them, which was Severus' only way to pry them off if they ignored his insults.

James packed up quickly to follow Evans. He already knew where she was going because she had been distracted the whole time he was patiently explaining their Potions work. The Marauders' plans to have their revenge on Snape for this summer had been put aside when he fell ill with dragonpox. Now that McGonagall was on their backs, he couldn't just curse him from across the Great Hall, but if he hung around enough, there was sure to be a clear case for James to claim self-defense.

Frowning, Sirius got up slowly. Prongs was going to make a total ass out of himself, chasing after toadlike Evans, like she had a snitch up her snatch. He said his plan was to get friendly, not pathetic.

Remus decided to stay with Helen and Mary. They were talking, rather than trading insults. Why waste this opportunity? This conversation could lead to thawing the cold war between the sexes in Gryffindor. He didn't have a class till later, and the ladies had a little time before they needed to get to Muggle Studies. Perhaps he could walk them to class.

Regulus saw Snape's mudblood whore heading right their way. Even under the most optimal conditions, Snape wouldn't be able to attract a suitable girlfriend, but with his green face currently ravaged with pockmarks, that audacious harlot was going to be the only ride he was going to get. She was probably coming over here to shamelessly plead with Snape. Evans was so atrocious now, he probably preferred wanking to her in the dark and wearing a sack over her head. It was unfortunate that Potter and his gormless brother were too far behind her, or else he'd give everyone a laugh. Ah well, patience was supposedly a virtue.

With a cheery wave, Regulus called, "See you later, Snape," and headed to the other door to reach the staircases. He paused long enough at the door to give his brother a one-fingered salute once he got Sirius' attention.

"What's all this then?" Lily asked as she joined up with what remained of the younger Slytherins around Severus.

"Nothing," Severus replied as the others dispersed to avoid conversing with a mudblood.

"Really?" Lily asked mischievously. "I thought for a moment that the Slytherins had a rock star at their table."

He muttered, "Later."

Ignoring his marred nemesis, James reached them and asked, "Alright Evans?"

Annoyed that she still had Potter tagging along, "Absolutely spiffing, Potter." For Severus' benefit, she added, "Potter and Black have Potions first thing today too."

He nodded, letting his hair fall back in front of his face before heading out the door to head down into the dungeons.

His hair was ineffective because Sirius already got more than a eyeful, making him forget all about Regulus. Shit, he thought, that spell was as evil as the rest of the book. Snape was always grotesque, but now his visible vileness was piteous. How could they let him back into Hogwart's looking like this?

On the way down the stairs, Sirius called, "Oy, Snape. You know how to spell ugly? U … U … you," he began pointing at Snape, "you … you … you."

Severus smirked, and replied in an odd voice (to the Gryffindor boys), "Good one, Black."

It wasn't good enough for Lily because she gave Sirius a punch to the shoulder. Rather than getting both toads croaking at him, Sirius pretended Lily's hardest girly punch hurt and rubbed the spot.

James frowned at Sirius. Calling someone else recovering from dragonpox ugly with Evans right here was going to mess up his plans. Why didn't Padfoot think first? And what was Snape up to, not casting something at Black in response? And what was the deal with his voice? It sounded tolerable.

Cautious that something was about to erupt, James got out a mess of words, "Uh … Padfoot, we got Potions. No time to admire … uh"

Disgusted by his best friend's incoherence over a really fugly girl, Sirius batted his eyes at Snape, "The green really brings out your eyes, Snivelly." Evans' eyes and hair were a terror with the dragonpox green skin.

Severus sneered at him, and continued towards the classroom.

"Anyway, Evans, Sluggy gave us assigned seats. There's an empty one next to mine," James said with a smile. "I'll show you where."

Lily did not want to sit next to James Potter, but it had to be better that she took that seat, rather than Severus.

Pointing as they entered the room, Sirius said, "I think you are in the back corner, Snivelly."

Severus didn't care. As long as Potter and Black were in front of him, he could keep an eye on them.

Lily went with James and Sirius to the front of the room to the opposite corner, furthest from Slughorn's desk. James shared a table with her, and Sirius sat directly behind her. Sirius did not like this at all because Evans was a bit of a prick with her prefecting, shushing, and just all around swottiness. She would probably try to intercept every note between him and James just on principle, and be an outright bitch every time they tried to joke around. Potions was going to be hell. Old Sluggy thought the sun shown from Evans' green bottom.

Severus was in a mixed section, with Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs. Wilkes and Rosier shared a table in the center of the room, like they did in earlier years.

Prof. Slughorn entered the classroom and went to his desk. He tapped the board, and today's expected potion recipe was written upon it. "Alright you lot … Snape, get up front where I can keep an eye on you." Slughorn pointed to where Lily was. Pleasantly, he continued, "Miss Evans, please take that seat at the back of the room. You are more than capable of working independently."

"Professor," James complained while raising his hand to gain his attention. Frustrated, Sirius rested his head in his hands. Who wouldn't rather have Snivelly at their mercy, than Evans griping for them to shape up and keep things tidy?

Both overheard Lily muttering, as she put her items back in her bag to take to the back of the room, "Lying sack of refuse. Sev could brew circles round you and you know it."

Severus did not need to pack anything since he hadn't bothered to take anything out yet. He moved to the front of the room with his things in the same slow, rounded shoulder gait that he'd been using all morning. He was also muttering as he passed in front of Potter who was lowering his hand in disappointment when Slughorn continued to ignore him, "... fuckwitted wanker can't see shit."

Although Lily hadn't reached her new seat either, Slughorn tapped his foot impatiently, "Stop making us wait all period till you get settled, Snape."

Looking up from his bag, Snape replied with a sneer, "I've been ill. I have a note from St. Mungo's, if you'd like to see it, Professor."

"You aren't going to be able to use that excuse when you take your NEWTs, are you?"

Snape went back to pulling out what he needed without replying. He knew that Slughorn had no hand in marking OWLs or NEWTs since they were also a test of how effective he was as a teacher.

The Gryffindors and Slytherins in the class knew that Slughorn disliked Snape, and constantly praised his old lab partner, Evans, a shining example of his Slug Club, on her sterling ability to work with such a disaster, and how kind she was to assist such a talentless brewer. Snape's roommates didn't believe that crap for a second, but knew that Snape was too ugly for the Slug Club, no matter how talented he was, his looks and personality were as big a hindrance as his lack of wealth and connections. Potter and Black knew that Snape was at least good at Potions so it was rather pointless for Sluggy to maintain the charade, except for the pure entertainment value.

Rather than joining the rush to get supplies, Severus hung back so he would not be in the crush. He took his time at the table setting up his cauldron and other implements before going to the cabinet.

Both James and Sirius started to realize how sick Snape still was as class wore on. He was usually very quiet, but the heavy mouth breathing and throat clearing he was doing on the stairs on the way down, continued. James looked over to see if his archenemy was smirking at being such a noisy prick intentionally. Unlike them, Snape was seated, with his hair hanging in front of his face, and leaning on the table as he chopped precisely, but his long, bony, spider-like fingers lacked their usual accelerated speed. Sirius used to kid that Snape got that fast cutting up kittens as a kid.

After sharing a glance with Sirius, James went back to concentrating on his potion, ignoring the revolting sounds Snape was making. Things were going well for him, when James looked at the board for the next step and saw he was to add his three drams of crushed dried dittany. He had it already prepared and lifted it towards his cauldron, when Snape slapped his book hard, like he was killing a bug. James looked over in disgust, seeing that Snape's book was in such poor shape that many things could be living in it. Snape jabbed his finger at the text. James looked at his own book and then back at the board. Not trusting Snape to have changed the text of his book, he leaned over and grabbed Snape's sliding it close enough to read. It did have the same instruction as his, to stir slowly clockwise till the potion changed to magenta. Snape's book's margins were filled with scrawls, but James didn't have time to read them because Snape snatched his book back.

"Stop bothering Mr. Potter, Snape. You should have come prepared to class, instead of being a disturbance to others."

Merlin, how did hotheaded Evans put up with that for five years? wondered James. This wasn't the first time old Sluggy left an important step off the board. The students were supposed to be prepared and use their texts when this happened before. Most of the time, the class just let their potions fail in sometimes spectacular fashion. James started stirring, and turned to emphasize his motion to Sirius till his friend nodded in understanding.

At the end of class, half the students had potions that looked like Snape's, Potter's and Black's, including Evans. Since Slughorn was never wrong, the ones that caught the error didn't bother mentioning it to their classmates till they left the room.

Since Magical Creatures was cancelled, the Gryffindors didn't have to rush out of the castle to get to their next class in time. Lily was walking beside Severus towards the stairs already, when James caught up to him.

"Why'd you point out the missing step, Snape?"

Shrugging, and continuing to head up the stairs because he had Ancient Runes, he said, "You would have noticed on your own if I wasn't being a distraction."

James narrowed his eyes, trying to unveil the insult contained in that statement. Trying to act like he understood it, he replied, "Right then."

Thinking he had just scored a point with Evans by not hexing her oddball friend, he suggested, "So Evans, why don't we head up to the Tower and grab our Charms books? We have that after lunch."

"I think I know where we are, Potter, but it wouldn't hurt to review."

Remembering Sirius' advice, James restrained himself from looking pleased. It was schoolwork after all.

Black couldn't take any more of Prongs being a blockhead so headed off to have some fun on his own that certainly didn't include looking at a textbook. If James wasn't careful, she'd have him working hard to be Head Boy next.

Lily called up to Severus who turned to go up a different flight of stairs, "I'll see you in Charms, Sev."

Not having as much energy, or enthusiasm as Lily, he simply replied, "Yeah."

Lily declined James' offer to carry her bag, once the two of them were left on their own to head up to Gryffindor. Not thinking of what else they could talk about other than school and the _possible_ invitation to sit next to him for quidditch or maybe a date to Hogsmeade, once James had buttered her up some, he decided to talk about a very unpleasant subject that was of interest only to Evans. "Snape seems sicker than you, Evans."

"He is. His case was life-threatening."

James scoffed, "At his age?"

Annoyed, Lily asserted, "Yes. Why do you think I'd make something like that up, Potter? Couldn't talk, see or breathe. Is that sick enough for you?"

Backpedaling, James commented, "It's just unusual. And he's back at school the same time as you, but … even the stairs seem a bit much for him still."

"Someone thought it was a spell, rather than us catching it normally, but I don't know if there was ever any proof."

"Dragonpox isn't from a spell."

"And we're both back now because we'd risk having to wait till next September if we were out longer."

"You seem mostly recovered, Evans. Not getting winded, and here we are on our fourth flight."

"I think he was afraid that I'd sit out the year too, if he was unable to return to school."

"Why would you do that?"

Lily frowned at James. "It's complicated. He's back so it doesn't matter."

Concerned that he was upsetting her, James silently contemplated if his friends were sick. His parents wouldn't let him skip a year of school, even for his best friend, Sirius. Girls were always exaggerating about small things like they were life or death. Merlin!

After spending an hour revising Charms with Evans, James felt that she was in a good enough mood to broach the subject of this weekend. "So Evans, with Parkin playing against Slytherin this Saturday, how about you and MacDonald join us fellows in the stands cheering our team?" He was very pleased how he made it sound like they'd all be cheering for that talentless wannabe Parkin. Just because her family played quidditch forever, didn't make her any good. Gryffindor might as well write off the Quidditch Cup now, and sure as heck better study and show off in class like a bunch of Ravenclaws to get the points to win the House Cup. This mess was all Snape's fault. As soon as he was well enough, they'd set him up to lose every emerald in Slytherin's hour glass.

"Well, that does sound nice if the weather's good. Um, I don't know what Mary thinks, and I might be doing some one-on-one work with a teacher to get caught up."

James restrained himself, what does weather have to do with quidditch? Girls!!! "Just give it some thought, Evans."

****************************

Regulus Black spent a good part of History of Magic contemplating his absolutely brilliant idea that had formed at breakfast. If there was a mudblood that certainly didn't know her place, it was Lily Evans.

She weaseled her way into Slughorn's favorites by seducing that half-blood Snape and getting him to do her Potions work, and probably the rest of her homework too. No Slytherin needed to be a genius to figure out where to get a quick help for homework. Just ask Snape, and embedded in the insults, he'd give the answer. The hardest part was tracking him down some nights.

Evans probably gave it up to Snape first year when she found out how easy he was. If Regulus had to do Evans, the only thing that would give him pleasure would be shoving it throat deep into her gob and gagging her while she polished his nob. Otherwise, she'd talk the whole time.

Oh no, down boy! … this was no state to be in while listening to Binns lecture. Evans' green pocky face … yes, that was a turn-off. Especially when she was strutting around Hogwart's, waving her prefect badge, nagging everyone to tuck in their shirts, stop horsing around and actually reading Filch's list of banned items. Probably does Filch too while his cat watches. Yup, that's the ticket.

Annoyed that his brother and his dumbass Marauders got credit for his first jinx, he finally shared it with his best friend, Barty. He could trust Barty not to use it indiscriminately. His friend was so tightly wound, when he finally blew like a cauldron, it was going to be more than a couple girls' blouses. Reg's money was on showing his father the killing curse. Barty's father was one of those fanatical Ministry drones who never came home, and thought every little thing reflected on his becoming Minister of Magic one day.

Breasts were really so last year anyway. Regulus already had his next jinx ready. It wasn't as revealing as his one from last year, but it was a thrill to see a skirt blow up inexplicably and catch a good glimpse of knickers. Unless the victim forgot to put a pair on that morning.

****************************

Lily was able to get rid of Potter for lunch, explaining that her return meant nothing with respect to whatever altercation was going on between the Gryffindor males and females. She could deal with that after she caught up on her homework, she thought as she joined Helen and Mary. It would take a lot of hard work to overcome the Marauders' reputation for being a gang of bullying pervs, but the rest of the Gryffindor lads did not need to be automatically treated the same way.

Mary asked Lily as soon as she sat down, "Which boys are muggleborn?"

"Uh ..." Lily hesitated, trying to think. She didn't think of anybody by their parents really, unless they were overwhelming gits. That was the purebloods only. "mmm... why?"

"We're doing really bad in Muggle Studies without you, Lily," Helen said.

"We got back our essays on muggle vacations today," Mary moaned. "Seems that my wanting to drive an automobile is not what muggles do on vacation."

"And I thought mine was better because I was going to ride in an aeroplane, without crashing."

Lily made a face. She helped Helen and Mary by not letting them turn in glaring errors, but how could they not know what to do on holiday? "So why do you need a boy? Muggle dating?"

"We wish. I think we're going to have to wait till 7th year for that. We're still on muggle leisure activities."

"This section is on sports," Helen said in disgust. "They don't have quidditch, and … the muggle photos that we were shown today … boring doesn't even begin to describe it."

Indignant, Lily said, "I am aware of muggle sports."

"We have to write a lot, Lily. Do you know that much about rules and famous players?" Mary asked.

"Darn. If only you told me in advance. They had the Olympics over the summer."

"What's that?"

"A big sporting event that happens every four years with all the muggle countries sending their athletes to represent them. It's a lot of different sporting competitions like gymnastics and ice skating. Well both of those wouldn't be in the summer, I think gymnastics is possibly summer, but ice skating and dancing is definitely winter."

Her friends looked at her in confusion. "Is there anything even slightly like quidditch?" Helen asked. "We don't want to be bothered with learning a whole lot of stuff about something muggles think is sport."

"They play a lot of games with balls. I think all of them are just one ball in play at a time."

Mary replied, "Well, I guess that goes without saying. Muggles can't concentrate on numerous things and complex rules."

Lily paused, wondering if her friend ever engaged her brain before speaking. "I can name them, and tell you basic rules from when I played them in muggle school. Maybe Severus could be more help, if I can lure him over to your table in the library."

"Snape? He doesn't seem the sporting type."

"No, he isn't, but his father …" Lily halted. This wasn't going to help. They had no telly, so that's one of the reasons Sev's father was always at the pub. Severus didn't watch sports, and was never bothered playing when her and Petunia had something to throw or kick around.

"Something wrong, Lily?"

"No," she answered, trying to shake off the feeling of sadness that had started to come over her. There were people that just didn't like to play games. "How about you show me those essays?"

"Only if you promise not to laugh, and you get your friend to talk to us," Mary replied. She didn't want to talk to Snape, but if there was a chance he did know some sport well enough that they wouldn't have to make one up using the rules Lily knew, it might get her grade out its tailspin.

"I don't know if he knows enough to be helpful, but I will ask."

"And get him over to that library table tonight, before other girls sit down," Helen insisted, as she handed over her essay involving flying around the world, and all the fabulous fun she had on the aeroplane.

Lily looked them over. She doubted the passengers on that Playboy plane she had seen on television had this much fun, and room to move around. Mary's drive involved doing a lot more than concentrating on the road, and never mentioned stopping to do all these other activities so Lily guessed Mary thought she could do it all while driving at the same time. Real muggle life would be a real drag for her witch friends.

****************************

Further down the table, a late rising Peter commented, "Evans is hideous."

Ignoring James' open mouthed gasp, Sirius agreed, "Totally, Wormtail. Even you are too good for her."

"Padfoot! I got a great sense of humor, and I tell good stories. Girls find me very entertaining."

"Yeah, when you move in for a kiss … they laugh in your face," Sirius replied.

"Just cut it out. It'll clear up," James insisted.

"Good thing you decided to wait. Some of those marks linger for years," Peter said while nodding in thought.

"Prongs is not that shallow," Remus insisted. "And Evans is a very nice person, green or not."

"Oooh, do I sense some competition here, Moony?" Sirius joked.

James glared at Remus. He wouldn't try to make a move on Lily while James was waiting for her to be … less green, would he?

"Of course not. Our friendship is stronger than any girl."

Out of the murmured agreement, Sirius said, "And it's damn straight we wouldn't let someone as ugly as that destroy the Marauders."

"Just stop it, Padfoot. And you too, Wormtail," James growled, putting an end to this cruel joking. "I've already asked Evans and MacDonald to sit with us for the quidditch match Saturday. You are not to make stupid jokes about her dragonpox."

Sirius' face fell. "Why, Prongs? Next you'll say we have to cheer for Parkin."

Groaning, Peter added, "Can we sit in the front row of the box so I can just pitch myself over when it gets too bad?"

Sticking his finger out, and pointing it at Peter, James asserted, "I'll give you a hand, Wormtail, if you so much as dare give Evans a dirty look."

"Calm down," Remus said while motioning with his hands. "It was nice talking to them at breakfast this morning. We can all cheer for Gryffindor without turning on each other."

"I suppose," Sirius muttered.

Peter remained silent. If Sirius and James wanted to play nice with those bitches, he might as well go along with it. He didn't have to like it though.

****************************

A lot of sixth year students were taking Charms. Prof. Flitwick was rather brave having all four houses crowded into his classroom at once, rather than splitting it out into two separate classes.

Since Wilkes sat with Avery in this class, Helen and Mary gave him a wide berth. Lily indicated where Severus was sitting high in the back by himself, but they shook their heads as they headed to their usual seats. Lily hissed, "Shouldn't we go up there and ask him about the library later?"

Both Mary and Helen made faces at the notion of joining Severus Snape when it wasn't a necessity. If Wilkes and Rosier weren't with him, then absolutely not. Helen finally said, "Go head," when Lily chose to stand there, starting to cause a scene.

All four Marauders arrived together and in time to not be late, and took their usual seats together in the midst of the room. James frowned when he saw Evans sitting up in the back with Snape. "What's that?" he asked with a jerk of his head to indicate what upset him.

Remus shrugged. "They both missed a lot of class. If they can't do today's work, no one can stare at them back there without turning around."

"Who'd want to stare at them?" Peter persisted.

"Not me," Sirius agreed. Then he teased James, "You don't think they have a little something going on besides just being friends … lifelong friends, who share all their secret thoughts with each other, do you, Prongs?"

James was revolted at the thought. Who would be best friends with slimy Severus Snape?

"You think she likes getting all greasy?" Peter giggled.

"No," James insisted.

"People can be friends without doing that," Remus reminded them.

"Maybe she saw something she couldn't resist, thanks to Padfoot," Peter continued with his mind in the gutter.

"Evans is not that kind of girl," James denied.

"That's not fair, Wormtail. There was some crazy rumor that Padfoot did that intentionally because he wanted to see Snape undressed, and we know how untrue that is," Remus reasoned.

Sirius' voice rose at the mention of that foul lie, "Hell yeah." All other talking in the room stopped as Prof. Flitwick entered and signaled for quiet, but Sirius continued loudly, "I do not fancy Snape."

The class broke out in laughter, and the teacher calmed them down by saying, "Thank you for sharing that, Mr. Black. Now let's get back to where we were ..."

If Lily's skin wasn't so green, she was sure she'd be red as almost every student turned to look at Severus. The Marauders really were a bunch of stupid toerags, no matter how nice they acted towards her so far today.

Once Prof. Flitwick started class and everyone's attention was facing forward, including the hostile glares from Black and Potter, Lily sneaked a sideways peek at her friend. He raised an eyebrow to her in response.

Lily went down to get their materials since Sev didn't sound too good. As she headed back up, she felt a little nervous. This was her first time partnering with Severus in Charms. She was good at this subject, but after missing so much class, what if she was rusty, and couldn't do this by the end of class and everyone else did? Lily also wanted to talk to Severus, but she didn't want to waste precious time when she was supposed to be getting this charm right, so she hissed at him when she returned, "Let's work on this first, then we can talk."

"Sure, Lily."

As time passed, Lily was getting nervous and then panicky as bursts of song could be heard throughout the classroom as others accomplished the charm, and then performed some variations. Severus had gotten a few seconds of some flute-like notes before it failed. He had wordlessly stopped it because he wanted Lily to perform it successfully first, but not so much that he did not learn it.

Time was running out, and Lily was getting frustrated. She was sure she was close, and Sev was agreeing she that she had the right wand movements and pronunciation, and encouraged her to concentrate, rather than practicing himself.

She threw her wand down and muttered, "I can't get this, and you are wasting your time when you should be doing it, Sev."

With a sigh, Severus put his wand down, and picked up hers. Leaning closer, he took Lily's right hand in his and then placed her wand in it. "Stop being so impatient," he said softly near her ear as he continued to remain near her. "You can cast this. Let's just try it together, both the wand movement and the incantation."

When Severus did not let go of her wand hand, Lily questioned, "Together?"

"It's worth a try. My mother showed me hover and summoning charms this way when I was young. Just ignore that I'm casting it too, and cast it as you normally would."

Lily felt a spark of warmth at the thought of Mrs. Snape casting spells with Severus. When she hesitated, he whispered urging, "Start any time, Lily."

Oh yeah, she thought, I'm the one holding the wand. Severus did not resist when she raised her hand, and allowed his hand to rest lightly on hers like it was just coming along for the ride. At the beginning of the spell, she heard him match her incantation and felt a tingle pass through her hand as the spell was cast. There was music, but not a song Lily knew. It had female vocals, not in English, and some matching soft instrumental with the vocal portion being the primary sound.

"Did you cast that?" Lily asked, glancing at his hand upon her wand hand still.

"Your wand shouldn't let me cast something without your cooperation."

"That's not an answer."

Severus removed his hand slowly and the song continued, but changed, with the voice fading away.

"Try it again, without me."

Lily did, and an entirely different song started playing softly. It sounded like muggle pop music, but not quite because Lily couldn't quite remember this one, even though it was familiar.

"That's nice," Severus breathed next to her. He didn't care for it, but it was Lily's.

"Hmm," Lily replied, letting it continue and swaying a little in time with it.

Originally, Lily was going to let it continue long enough for Prof. Flitwick to mark her down as knowing the charm, since he was working his way towards them, but then she caught sight of the Marauders staring back at her and Severus.

What was their problem? Couldn't she sit next to her best friend and work on a spell without them going all Neanderthal?

Looking over Lily's head, Severus gave them his best 'bring it' smirk. He had played nice all day around her, but their dragonpox, while unfortunate, was bound to make others show their true colors. Severus would love Lily no matter how she looked. It was about time for her to see how people truly were, instead of dreaming that they possessed some ounce of hidden virtue and repeatedly giving them another chance.

"Just like a filthy Slytherin. He's using Evans as a shield," James growled.

"We can get him after class, Prongs," Peter assured his friend. It had been a boring month without Snape. This would be sweet.

"His greasy hair is touching hers," Sirius pointed out in disgust, even though Snape's hair had been recently washed and was cleaner, yet just as lank and lifeless.

"Snape's been ill," Remus reminded them.

"He's been faking how sick he is. You should have heard Evans earlier," James informed them. It was just pathetic that Snape used something as simple as dragonpox to pull the wool over poor Evans' eyes because she was muggleborn.

"McGonagall," Remus muttered warningly, as Prof. Flitwick passed in front of Evans.

"He's got her believing his lies too."

After they resumed a proper distance by Severus sliding his seat back into the corner, Prof. Flitwick pleasantly asked, "How are you two doing with this one?"

"Fine, Professor," Lily replied and cast the charm flawlessly.

"Excellent, Miss Evans. And you, Mr. Snape?"

Severus cast it quietly, but the resulting sound was like a car wreck to Lily's ears.

"Good," Flitwick replied to be kind. He wasn't here to grade people's taste, or lack of it, in music.

"How about you two see me after class to see if we can set up some evening review?"

They agreed, and Flitwick continued on.

"Sev, can you meet me in the library tonight?"

"Of course. What time?"

"Um, I'm not sure. Do you know what time Wilkes and Rosier are there?"

Severus gave her a pained look. "Is it to meet you, Lily, or you need me for something else?"

"Am I that transparent, Sev?"

"I'll still meet you, but I would like to be prepared. Unless you have some sort of surprise in mind."

"Surprise? Uh, no. It's just that um... Mary and Helen need a lot of help with Muggle Studies."

"Can't you help them, Lily? I don't have much hands-on experience with muggle devices. I can recognize them quicker than a wizard, but you have a better idea of how to use them."

"It's not that complex. Let them explain it. Anyway, they want us to sit with them at your housemates' table so others can't sit there."

"I'm not looking to get into a conflict with other Slytherins."

"Don't they need your assistance too, Sev?"

"When they ask. They aren't helpless, Lily."

"Perhaps Mary and Helen want to test them."

"It's not smart forcing them into anything. I'll be in the library after dinner, and we'll take it from there."

Lily verbally agreed, "Alright," but thought Severus was being a bit overcautious. It was only homework in the library.

After class, they packed slowly and waited till the room cleared to speak with Prof. Flitwick.

Outside of the Charms classroom, the Marauders chose positions using the stairs, a nook in the hallway, a statue and a suit of armor. Since Remus' heart was not in this, he chose to serve as a lookout on the stairs. Peter was chosen to keep an eye on the other end of the hall. However, he was eager to see what his pals did to Snivelly so kept his avid gaze on the Charms door, more than on the hall.

James whispered more than once to Sirius, "Don't hit Evans."

"OK. OK. I can tell the difference between your lady and the great greasy git, even if both of them are green."

Seeing how Prof. Flitwick was the first professor to approach them, their schedules were wide open. After a short discussion to push back this evening's library plans, they agreed to meet with Flitwick for an hour after dinner so he could assess what he needed to cover since both were good students. Severus reminded Lily that they needed to go to Defense next, however since she was still in conversation with Prof. Flitwick, he agreed to walk with them a ways towards their next class.

Leading the way, Prof. Flitwick opened the door to the hallway and immediately sprung into action whipping out his wand to cast a shield charm. He hadn't lost his sharp reflexes after retiring on top from professional dueling after he defended his championship numerous times.

"Black!" he called, identifying his assailant who had stepped out from behind the armor to cast the jinx.

Sirius replied with a light-hearted, "Whoops!"

"And you, Potter, and you down there, Pettigrew. What's the meaning of this? Laying in wait to ambush students outside my door?"

Lily stood looking over Prof. Flitwick, completely aghast. Behind her, Severus egged the Marauders on with that same smirk from earlier.

Remus peeked to see what was going on from the stairwell, and ducked back out of sight. His friends hexed Flitwick?

Brazenly, James said, "What? I didn't cast anything. That's against school rules, Professor."

"I was just polishing the doorknob," Sirius insisted.

Lily and Severus were excused to continue on to class. Lily started muttering immediately, "That sneaky toerag. He was nice to me all day, and then when he thinks he's earned my trust, he does something like that."

Reaching the stairs, Severus asked, "Waiting to push us, Lupin?"

"No," Remus responded, saddened by the glare Lily gave him. She wouldn't think he'd do something like that?

"Better move it, Lupin, or you'll be late to wherever you're heading," Lily snapped.

"Right," he muttered, once again puzzled how things kept going wrong. Well, except for the fact that his friends did careless things impetuously, but they had always been this way. Remus was also a bit miffed that Snape preceded him on the stairs, staying to the outside of Evans and holding her elbow protectively. Remus Lupin did not push people off staircases, and did not like being mistaken for the other Marauders, who would shove Snape off for a laugh.

The three of them made it to Defense in time. Potter, Black and Pettigrew arrived ten minutes late, and tried to use the excuse that Prof. Flitwick had held them back, but they had no pass. They loudly complained when they lost Gryffindor five points each because they had already lost a total of thirty points to Flitwick earlier – twenty for Black, and five each for Potter and Pettigrew. Flitwick also promised to have a word with McGonagall regarding detentions.

Peter was bitter that Remus ran off and was sitting in Defense without them. Not that he could have done something, but the Marauders should stick together through thick and thin. Peter would never have left Sirius and James.

Lily was sitting in the back with Severus again. Helen and Mary were seated with Rosier and Wilkes, but there were no free seats around them when they arrived. Lily did not like sitting in the back, but could now understand why Severus preferred keeping everyone in front where he could see them. From the way Black, Potter and Pettigrew glared at them when they came in, she wouldn't put it past them to jinx them in the back during class. How was it her fault that they shot a spell at Prof. Flitwick? Idiots never wanted to take any responsibility for their own actions.

After class, Lily ignored Potter as she went back to Gryffindor tower with Helen and Mary before dinner. Why did that moron think she'd fall for his sincere act twice in one day? She should have known better this morning. It's not like the Marauders would suddenly be mature after all they've done, would they? Stripping students not four months ago, and attacking muggles over the summer holiday.

Lily was stowing away her things, and getting some fresh parchment together for her Charms session with Prof. Flitwick, when Mary mentioned, "Oh, forget about bringing Snape over in the library. Malcolm and Evan don't want to be around him right now."

Annoyed, Lily asked, "Why not?"

"Some altercation with Mulciber."

"Neither of you like Mulciber. Why are you going to let him dictate who you can talk to?"

"We could talk to Snape if we needed to, but you know, Lily, we were thinking. Could you go, as a prefect, and inspect the Gryffindor boy rooms and see if any of them have up muggle posters of favorite teams? We'll even settle for a firstie."

Logically, Severus would be pleased to not help Mary and Helen, but Lily had already asked him and just wasn't happy about this. "No, I'm not going snooping through the boys' rooms for you. Announce what you need in the common room, and see if you get any takers. And another thing, I think I'm going to sit with Severus in the library because I already invited him there."

"Can't you just uninvite him?" Mary asked.

Helen added, "It is Snape."

Ticked, Lily asked, "Oh, so it's alright for you to talk to him to introduce you to others and when you might need homework help, but cast him aside when it's convenient?"

"What's gotten into you, Lily? Why are you bothering to spend any time with him?"

"You may have gotten dragonpox, but even with that as an excuse, he's ugly all the time."

"I may have ignored my best friend to spend time with you two because you are my housemates, and that's the way things are done at Hogwart's. We're like a family. I just thought … I don't know, I just thought over the summer when you took an interest in his housemates that it would be like the six of us together. _Please forgive me_ for being so optimistic," Lily added with heavy sarcasm for her foolishness at thinking things were going well.

"Lily, you are blowing this all out of proportion. There was a crisis in Gryffindor, so we were willing to talk to a couple Slytherins to meet some nice gentlemen. Severus Snape is not one of them, and we've always told you that from first year."

"We've kept you two apart for your own good. As soon as you look better, we'll find someone for you."

"Like who? Potter? Black? Lupin?"

"Maybe Lupin."

"No way. The only Gryffindor I've seen with consistent good traits is Frank Longbottom, and he's engaged now."

"You're lucky there. Heard his mother's a real terror."

"Sev's been my best friend for years, even when I ignore him at school. I don't see why we can't continue being friends, and now that you two are occupied, I can spend more time with him. Isn't that worth something? While you two date and meet nice gentlemen, I'm not sitting here all green and pining."

"No need to be so dramatic."

"And didn't the two of you kid around in June about his … you know?"

"Who could have missed that? But that's for a witch after she's married, had a couple children and wants some excitement. Just stay on friendly terms with him, and he's sure to meet you in Knockturn Alley to show you what you've been missing."

"Yes, Lily, don't do it now with him. He'll ruin you."

"Huh?"

"You didn't, did you?" Helen asked. Seeing Lily's puzzlement, she continued, "That's a relief, you could have sounded like you went all the way with him. That would have been a huge mistake."

"Yeah, your husband would definitely be able to tell … unless you married Hagrid."

"Are you two being disgusting? I said Severus is my friend."

"Well why'd you bring up his only pleasing feature then?"

"You were raving about it."

"It was a surprise, Lily. I mean, how could he be 'your best friend' and kept that hidden from you?" Mary asked.

Helen gasped and asked, "Oh my god, you knew didn't you? And you were keeping a secret from us."

"No. He … we don't get undressed. We don't even go swimming. So stop being such pervs and talking about someone who isn't even good enough for you to sit in the library with. Why can't a boy and a girl be best friends? I'm able to be friends with you without stripping off all my clothes."

"Well, you can certainly talk to him,but just remember, don't let him talk you into anything. No crap about how it's lonely being the only two green people at school, and that no one but you pays attention to him. Just friends, and try to have that friend thing fade into nodding acquaintance when you pass in the hall."

Lily threw her hands up in the air. "You are being ridiculous. And you know what, maybe I won't be a coward and let Mulciber tell me who I can be friends with either."

With that, Lily marched out of the room and headed to the Great Hall for dinner, before all the food on their end of the table slid its way down to the gluttonous boys.

****************************

James felt it was time to lay down the rules. He thought he had already done it, but obviously the rest of the Marauders did not have their listening ears on. Now he had their full attention while they were in their room before dinner. No distractions of the common room, and here he could speak loud and clear without being made fun of by the other blokes.

He paced as he talked, "First off, no ugly jokes or comments. That means at Evans, around Evans, at Snape even if you don't see Evans."

"Here now," Sirius complained. "Even Snape liked my U joke."

James grabbed his hair, messing it up in the way he didn't like it. "Don't you see, Padfoot? Who came out of that looking like the jerk? You or Snape?"

"Snivelly did. I'm never a jerk."

Peter laughed.

"Both of you shut your cakeholes. I'm trying to be serious," James insisted.

"You can try, mate. But there's only one Sirius," Sirius commented, ignoring that his cakehole was ordered shut.

"This isn't a joke," James growled.

"We're listening, Prongs," Remus said reassuringly. "Maybe we need to keep calm, and let Evans come to you. By now, she knows you're interested."

"How could she not?" Peter asked. "You should play hard to get, Prongs, just until we see how bad she looks in a couple months." Hastily he added, "Not that I expect she'd be ugly. She's always been quite the looker."

"I want to be sure she knows the offer is still open."

"While we have time, we could investigate deeper. What has prevented Evans from succumbing to your charms? If it was quidditch, you no longer spend time on it," Remus contemplated.

"Quidditch?" exclaimed James, Sirius and Peter together.

"Quidditch gets me babes, Moony," James said confidently. "You know next spring or summer I should try out for a pro team so then Evans will know I have a job lined up when I graduate."

"Excellent idea, Prongs. Shows you are responsible," Sirius agreed. "But aren't you applying for the aurors with me? We can catch slimy creeps like Snivelly together. It'll be fun."

James shrugged, "Well, Padfoot, when you are as talented as me, it's likely that more than one career path will present itself. I'll play quidditch, get wealthy and famous, and then in about ten or twelve years, I'll tell the Ministry I'm ready to do my duty and catch dark wizards."

"Yeah, wouldn't want to do it the other way around and play quidditch when you have grandchildren," Peter said, loving James' plan.

Continuing with telling his friends of his life plan, James went on, "And _if_ Evans turns out to be Mrs. Potter, I got it all worked out in my head. We can have our first child right away, while I'm playing quidditch. Then when it's older and ready to enter Hogwart's, we can have the second one, and I'll take a little break between quidditch and being an auror to teach number one how to play quidditch so he or she can play on the house team their first year. That'll be expected with having a famous quidditch player as a father. So then, when number two is old enough to go away to school, we'll have another baby to keep the wife busy while I work. We'll just keep going like that with a new one about every ten years."

"That almost sounds brilliant enough for me to give up my dream of not marrying till I reach a hundred, Prongs."

Remus made a face. If Evans ever heard this plan, she would not be Mrs. Potter.

In awe, Peter finally took a breath and said, "That's beautiful. I want to do the same. Except the part about quidditch and dark wizards."

"Have you ever considered that your first two children might hold it against you if you name them number one and number two, Prongs?"

"If given a choice between number two and Sirius, I'd take the first one every time, Padfoot," James responded.

"That reminds me, I owe my own number two, Regulisp, a punch to the gut."

****************************

While Sirius ranted and raved over the Saturday detention he received to polish doorknobs around the castle, Lily finished eating dinner while keeping an eye on Prof. Flitwick, with occasional glances at Severus. Once again, he was surrounded by younger students. She'd have to ask him about Mulciber. Something strange was going on if the little snakes would stick close to him, whereas sixth years treated him like he had mange.

Severus stood right after Flitwick, so Lily followed suit to leave. She didn't spare her girlfriends any words. At this point, she might start swinging if they had any more advice.

Since Sev was taking the stairs at a comfortable pace, Lily was able to catch up. "What's the deal with Mulciber?"

"He talked to you?"

"No, but everyone's kind of saying things, so I thought the best thing would be to come to you."

"It was nonsense."

"What does that have to do with people avoiding you?"

"Not everyone. Avery's big mouth made me look like a hero to the little bullied Slytherins."

"Oh? What's wrong with being a hero, Sev?"

"I barely did anything. Mulciber's got two classes: Astronomy and History of Magic, and was carrying on last night because he had Astronomy later. If Mulciber doesn't sleep, he thinks no one else should. So when he didn't cut out what he was doing, I made his … picture book … slap his face. Once. He woke up with a black eye this morning, and Avery couldn't shut up."

"How does someone stay in Hogwart's with two classes?" Lily asked, trying to think up some profession that would involve those two subjects alone. Nothing against those areas, but someone only needed an 'A' take move on to NEWT level. They were treated like filler subjects when someone didn't get enough OWLs.

"If I was Slughorn, I'd make him repeat fifth year or leave. He didn't even make quidditch captain with all that spare time on his hands."

"I guess he's lucky you're not the head of Slytherin."

"Why would I want to stay in this sodding pile of stone longer than I had to, Lily?"

"You could solicit gifts like Slughorn."

"I don't need silk and satin pajamas in every shade of the rainbow, crystallized pineapple and chocolates."

"Do you even have pajamas, Sev?"

"What for?" he asked sarcastically as he opened the door to the Charms classroom.

Their discussion ended so they could pay attention to Prof. Flitwick for however long he was willing to tolerate them. Lily was in no hurry now that no one wanted them in the library.

They got far, and by the end of their two hours with Flitwick, they were completely caught up.

Lily asked, "Did you still want to go to the library, Sev? Or somewhere else?"

"What about Muggle Studies?"

"Forget it. They exaggerated how much help they needed."

"I don't need anything from the library to complete what I have for homework, Lily. If you need to go, I'll come along, if you want."

If you want? Lily thought over in her mind. How many times had Severus hinted that he could go with her wherever she wanted in Hogwart's, to have Lily reply that she didn't want or need him? "I'd enjoy your company, Sev. Oh and by the way," she added, grabbing at the sleeve of his robe. He stopped for her, and then with a quick glance around, Lily moved closer and said, "I haven't kissed you yet today." She only gave him a quick peck on the cheek.

"With school," he muttered, "if you miss a day, it's alright."

"If I miss a day too many times, I might have to resort to something desperate, and end up giant squidding you, Sev."

He took a deep breath, and raised an eyebrow in reply. Lily already had ideas about what she wanted to do, so he didn't bother answering. She could be moody, and normally had some excuse why she didn't want him to sit with her in the library. They were about to reach it. Severus was not going to hand her the fodder, preferring for her to think up her own justification. Lily already tried to use Mulciber earlier. Him and Avery were two of her favorite reasons to avoid him, as if he had some influence over them.

Rather than going into the middle of the room to look for a table, Lily turned to the side when they entered. With neither needing books, a cozy table for two on the outside perimeter would be dandy. She didn't want to hear all the muttering over the two of them being green, and definitely did not care what Helen, Mary, Malcolm and Evan were up to.


	26. Chapter 26 Things aren't the way

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 26 Things aren't the way they were before

Not completely trusting his ability to turn his bed into a securely warded fortress, Severus lay wakeful and alert while thinking about his first full day back at Hogwart's.

Although Mulciber had grunted in reply to Snape's explanation that the black eye was purely accidental, Avery's loose lips let all of Slytherin know, prior to Mulciber getting sorted by Pomfrey. The chance of retaliation was significantly increased, especially with a pack of little snakes shadowing him, waiting for Snape to trounce their hated nemesis again. Severus was sure they were doing it on purpose to provoke Mulciber because Slytherins were not so idiotic to think that his charm and wit would attract admirers.

Lily had spent more time with Severus yesterday than she ever had on a previous school day. His idea that they take the same classes was bearing fruit. Unfortunately, both Black and Potter were smarter than he thought and actually tested into Potions, Charms, Defense and Transfiguration. Perhaps their parents had paid off the OWL administrators.

It was a pleasant surprise when Lily parted from Parkin and MacDonald to join him in Charms, and then fortunate that they arrived later than them to Defense. Severus had always considered Potions to be a fluke due to Slughorn having them partner off into twos started first year. If Parkin and MacDonald had not hit it off so well on the first day, Lily would have sat on the other side of the room from him. Since then, her girlfriends took precedent over Severus in Lily's school social calendar.

In the library, Severus had found out they had done something to anger Lily, but she didn't say what. They'd probably be made up by this morning. He was the only one that Lily could stay mad at for days at a time. As a best friend, she had much higher expectations for him, so he had to be careful and weigh what he did and said prior to acting. She even had forgiven Potter and his dunderheaded lackies for jinxing her blouse. Severus wasn't going to forgive them for that, or what they did to him. How could he, when now the snickers were about how green his snake was?

In less than a day, the Marauders' facade had cracked. He saw the looks Black and Pettigrew gave Lily. Potter was too vain not to listen to them. By next week, he and the others would move on to find appropriate dates to Hogsmeade. If Parkin and MacDonald could be cut out of the picture, perhaps Severus' first outing to that bastion of adolescent wasteful consumption would actually be just him and Lily. He felt a smile creeping onto his face as he lay there looking at the bed canopy overhead. No, Severus knew what happened when he got his hopes up and start daydreaming about nice things. It would end in an outstanding disaster, and leave him pathetically clutching at the shards of his fantasies. It was perfectly fine to acknowledge there was the possibility that it could transpire that Lily and him might find themselves in each other's company in Hogsmeade, and nothing else.

For now, he would maintain his course. Lily insisted that Severus be the bigger man, and ignore the verbal insults and whatever slights he perceived. Be defensive, rather than offensive. With Lily around him so much, it seemed like a fine time to pretend to take her words to heart. It was gratifying to see it pay off so well on the first day with Black inadvertently casting a spell at Flitwick, when he mistook the teacher for him. Severus would not be so fortunate next time if Black learned his lesson and looked first, before jinxing. Who was he kidding? Black never learned.

************************

Lily woke feeling alone. Severus was down in the Slytherin dungeons, and she was in her room with her school friends, Mary and Helen. This had never been a problem in the past. Had she spent too much time with Severus? No, it was because Mary and Helen were being unreasonable. If they could just admit that Lily was right, and they were wrong, then everything would be back to normal. Well, as normal as it could be in Gryffindor right now.

She didn't even know if what they were saying yesterday was true. It wasn't the first time her best friend was accused of being inferior. Even Petunia didn't go as far as to say that if she remained friends with Severus that she'd be ruined for marriage. And what did Hagrid, the grounds keeper, have to do with that? Did Severus also know something about this, and that's why he asked Lily to marry him because no one else would want her?

Scrunching her face up in thought as she got ready, Lily went through the short list of people that she could rely on to tell her the truth about whatever wizard custom this was. She liked Healer Pye, but her general lack of privacy regarding Severus probably meant he'd overhead the whole thing, if they had their appointment together.

She could ask Severus himself. What would he say? Was it likely he would tell her the truth so she would have to make a decision on whether to remain his friend or not? It would be too cruel to ask him.

Madam Pomfrey's credibility had disappeared earlier this year over the dragonpox and that vicious lie she sent over to St. Mungo's in Sev's medical record. Lily clenched her fists, thinking she still had to straighten out Pomfrey and Slughorn on that. Of course she'd be in trouble for looking in someone else's record. Grumbling to herself, it would serve both of them when they saw how successful Sev was without either of their help. If it's one thing Lily could depend on, her friend knew how to hold a grudge.

Prof. McGonagall? She still needed to arrange for some make-up tutoring with her head of house. Severus would be there too, but it might be possible to sneak in some one-on-one time, even ahead of their tutoring to set up what time. But did Lily want to ask her head of house something and end up looking foolish?

Helen and Mary joined her and they exchanged brief greetings, maybe even a bit cold, before heading down to the Great Hall for breakfast. While eating, the mail owls arrived. Lily's was among them, and had another wrapped up tupperware with a letter. She had told her mum that they had lots of food at Hogwart's, and she didn't need to send anything. Probably because she had been sick, Lily thought as she opened the letter.

Happy she was well … back at school … everyone fine at home … very happy to receive a thank you from Severus, and Lily shouldn't have pestered him to write one! What the heck? Did he include something sarcastic? Can't even trust him to voluntarily write a simple thank you note. Lily glared over to the Slytherin table to see green Severus with a letter. It was still unopened in his hand, while he sneered at the gaggle of youngsters around him. Did her mum also write Sev? Better read the rest of her letter and find out. Here we are, being a pest … and sent her some cranberry bars … knows not to send food, but maybe she could share them with Severus since they weren't sweet.

Even though Lily was seated, she still managed to put her hands on her hips. She guessed Sev must have written a really nice thank you note, if her mother was now sending food to him … through her. Lily was not some, some, some what? messenger? delivery boy? She wasn't the least bit fooled. Cranberry bars? Since when did Lily ask for cranberry bars?

Lily got so caught up in frowning at her remaining breakfast that the next time she looked over at the Slytherin table, Severus was gone along with whoever had been sitting around him. Since she was the only sixth year girl from her house with Transfiguration, Lily decided to get going, rather than waiting for anyone.

She was still climbing stairs, when she was held up along the way to Transfiguration because it was blocked solid with students. No one was moving, but when she overheard some sort of altercation overhead, Lily started pushing her way through, declaring, "Make way. I'm a prefect."

As immobile students turned to see who was being so swotty, they realized it was Miss Dragonpox, and immediately cleared a path so she wouldn't touch them. There was a couple younger Gryffindors at the scene of … uh, another Gryffindor second year who was red-eyed, with a very runny nose who waist deep in a slimey batch of bogies?

One of the puzzled Gryffindors who was trying to figure out how to assist without touching anything grew pleased, and said, "Excellent, Evans'll take points from those slimy Slytherins."

His partner even rubbed his hands in glee.

"What happened?" Lily asked, rather than just getting to work and taking points.

The slimy Gryffindor hiccuped out, "Slytherins … jinxed me. All I did was call that oddball Snivellus …"

Lily frowned. She had told Severus how many times that words were only words? "So Severus Snape did this to you?"

"No," interrupted one of the others. "We call him that every time we see him. He never bothers us. It was the other Slytherins."

"What?"

"We saw Snivelly on the stairs, and said 'Alright, Snivellus' like we always do. He ignored us 'cause he knows the Marauders will get him if he does anything, and strip all his slimy clothes off again, and then stick his head in the toilet to wash his greasy hair. But these others just started jinxing. It wasn't fair!"

"Fair!!!" Lily yelled. "It's not fair that you little toerags are keeping serious students from getting to class on-time. _Evanesco_." She cast it intentionally on the mess that had fallen off the student, leaving the remainder on him. "Five points from Gryffindor."

"But ..."

"And if you think I'm afraid of going up against your sainted Marauders again because they are going to strip off my clothes again too, then I only can advise you lot to get ready to carry them to the Infirmary."

Lily continued on her way, and when she heard muttering about "stupid green bitch", she yelled back, "Another five points from Gryffindor, and there's going to be no escaping from me in the common room, no matter how far you stick your heads up those toerags' asses."

There was a brief smattering of applause, and a young Hufflepuff boy cheered, "Yeah, Evans!"

So, Lily thought as she went up the stairs, holding court in the common room telling their stupid stories about how great they were. Perhaps if they were really brave, they could let their actions speak louder than words. Toerags, four on one, thinking their hot stuff, having their parents bail them out of any real trouble. Maybe Helen could do that Parkin Punch thing and knock brawny Mulciber right into their guffawing heads tomorrow.

She entered Transfiguration knowing that it took two sides to have a war, and headed right to Severus, sitting in the back alone at one of the two-person desks. Realizing she still had the cranberry bars in her hand as she went to slide onto the bench next to him, Lily dropped her bag to the floor and waved her mother's food at him, "Mum sent you cranberry bars."

Considering he was almost hit in the head with the container, Severus was cautious. "Perhaps we can share them after lunch, Lily?"

Blinking at Sev, who was leaning as far back as he could without getting off their bench, Lily said, "Right. We're in class. Sorry."

"You're angry at me?"

"What did you do?"

"Today?"

Lily nodded.

"Mmm, got up early to wash that skin potion off, dressed, went to breakfast, then here?"

"And?"

Severus shrugged at Lily. Perhaps he had a doppelganger?

"Anyone call you Snivellus today?"

With another hunch of his shoulders, he replied, "Probably."

"Nothing special about that?"

He held his hands up and said, "Why would that be special?"

"Perhaps a couple jinxes?"

"No, no one jinxed me yet today. That I know of," Severus pulled a large hank of his hair forward to make sure it was still black. Sometimes Lily found it funny to keep talking like nothing was wrong with it.

"Cut it out. I ran into the mess on the stairs after some kid called you Snivellus."

"Not me … I mean, I didn't mess … whatever."

Lily studied her friend. She knew he could lie very well, but he wasn't ashamed to admit that he cast a spell. He'd rather defend why he cast it, rather than if he cast it.

He added, "Why would I jinx every berk that called me Snivellus? I had somewhere to be." Enough people yelled things at him that he long ago stopped wondering what was wrong with him. If it wasn't here, he'd get called variations of that dirty Snape boy around home.

Lily continued to frown as she pulled her stuff out of her bag for class.

As the rest of the class settled, Lily asked, "You got a letter this morning?"

He nodded in reply.

"Was it from my mother?" she asked, concerned about what it could have said.

"No, that Lovegood fellow from the magazine."

"He wrote back to you?" Lily said with worry. It was nice for Sev to have someone to correspond with, but that guy was a crackpot.

Severus nodded again, as Prof. McGonagall called the class to attention.

************************

Lily was mortified in Divination. It seems at NEWT level that all predictions were publicly shared with the class. Therefore, her classmates' dreams were dull things about shoes, clothes, their owls, quidditch … and then there was Lily's. Oh ha ha, she dreamed about being pregnant. Mary and Helen gave her dirty looks as soon as it was read aloud, even though the professor thought Lily's boldness showed the makings of a true seer, unafraid to reveal what was revealed through her inner eye. And then, he had the nerve to point out she had correctly forecast sickness in September for her subject. While Severus remained nameless, since she was not allowed to make a prediction about herself, than it was probably about the only other green student at Hogwart's.

There were no Gryffindor sixth year boys in Divination. Thank goodness.

She spent the remainder of class trying to make herself appear as small and insignificant as possible, while still being green with red hair. Besides Mary and Helen's bold looks, the rest of the class kept taking turns giving her glances. Avery was openly leering at her, while the Slytherin girl was able to keep her nose and face scrunched for an incredibly long time. Maybe it would freeze that way.

Lily practically dropped out of North Tower when the trapdoor opened. Sev would be in Arithmancy, which is also on the seventh floor down this corridor, if Lily remembered correctly from her prefect patrols last year.

When Wilkes saw Lily come racing around the corner, he just threw a thumb over his shoulder to indicate Snape was still behind him. Rosier smirked. That mudblood had not a single trace of dignity.

Severus was still in the classroom, standing with Prof. Abstractus and two Ravenclaws at a board covered in mathematical gibberish. All the boards in the room were covered with numbers and symbols in different hues of chalk.

The Ravenclaws were so absorbed by the discussion that they ignored Lily in the doorway. Severus saw her and then broke into a rare open smile. He added something to the conversation, then nodded at whatever Abstractus replied, before heading towards his desk in the back to grab his bag. He jerked his head in Lily's direction before allowing his hair to fall over his face. It wasn't good enough because Lily could see he was still amused as she got closer to him.

"Are you laughing at me?"

Letting his hair fall back from his eyes as he hoisted his bag, Severus replied, "You were dancing in the door like you need to get to the ladies'." He then took a moment to compose himself by taking a deep breath, but still gave Lily a slight smile.

It was hard to get angry at Severus when he was so rarely like this, Lily thought. She explained, "I was anxious."

The smile left his face, and his eyes passed over her from head to toe, before he asked, "What about?"

Afraid to come right out and say it, Lily shrugged and said, "Everything."

"Did something happen?" Severus asked, coming to a stop outside the classroom. The seventh floor corridor was empty since it was time for lunch.

Lily stuck out her lower lip and muttered, "Lots." When Severus didn't respond, she asked, "Could you grab some lunch for us? We could go to Herbology really early."

He nodded as he went towards the stairs, "Bring your cloak. It's colder out, even with the sun. I'll meet you in front of the Great Hall."

"If it's too cold for you, maybe we could go in one of the greenhouses, Sev."

She heard him mutter as he turned off to take a shortcut down to Slytherin, "Too cold for me?"

"Yeah," Lily replied, childishly wanting to have the last word till they met again. Since they had already been on the seventh floor, Lily took a shortcut by going down half a flight, and waiting till the right staircase swung to the hallway to the Fat Lady's portrait, and then headed back up.

She took a deep breath before entering the Gryffindor common room. Lily was able to cross it to the girls' staircase without any distractions. When she reached her room, Mary and Helen were waiting. They had no class this afternoon, so could take their time.

"Lily, you left Divination so fast."

"I didn't like the way you were all looking at me," Lily replied while getting her herbology items together, along with her cloak and her mum's cranberry bars.

"It was strange. For someone who claims she's just best friends to dream she's pregnant."

"From a sneak slipping me a potion," Lily defensively replied.

"Do you think Snape would do that to you?" Mary asked.

Helen agreed, "He is good at potions."

"Why can't you give it a rest? I need some time. Then I'll let you know what I think."

"Think about what?" was called out behind Lily as she closed the door.

Lily saw Severus as she descended the stairs. He was in the corner near the door. Seeing her, he came out to escort her from the castle. A few other students were going for a walk too, while the weather was still nice enough. When she took his hand in hers, he asked, "That bad?"

She sighed, then muttered, "Place is crawling with toerags."

"Yes."

"At least I can count on you to agree with me, Sev."

He remained silent on that. As they walked along, he asked, "All the way down to the greenhouses?"

"Maybe in the sun over there," Lily said, indicating the spot with her free hand.

Severus slipped his cloak off and laid it out for them. He still had on his house sweater and robe so was warm enough. Lily slipped her cloak off, but laid it on the side. His was large enough for both of them, as long as they sat close.

Sitting, Severus opened his bag and pulled out food wrapped in so many of the school's linen napkins that Lily felt this was sure to cause trouble, if they were caught. She wasn't surprised that it was simpler fare, as she took an apple. A bit scandalized by her friend's thorough wrapping, Lily unwrapped it, and put most of the spare napkins in her bag.

Glancing at Lily, Severus did not believe his idea to let Lily's dragonpox drive away her fellow students could be going so well in less than two days. "Did you want to discuss it?" he asked.

"Not really, but I'm afraid it'll come round to you anyway."

"If you don't want to talk about it, Lily, that's fine."

Lily chewed on her lower lip, then admitted, "It's just out of control."

If Lily wanted to tell him, she would. Severus rarely listened to the nonsense that passed for gossip round this heap. These were the same morons that thought the Marauders were heroes, other than the juveniles that were following him around for two days. Both groups were equally asinine. He reached around her back, and placed his hand lightly on Lily's opposite shoulder.

She wasted no time accepting Sev's invitation and leaned against him. Bowing her head, Lily rested it against his upper chest and placed her hand on his knee. "Last year, being a prefect no one listened to was bad enough, but they are just getting even more crude and immature. My own house is worst. They take advantage of my wanting to trust and believe in them."

Although the simplest course would be to agree, Severus knew Lily would forgive them yet again. Concurrence could be held against him later. "Not everyone can live up to your high standards, Lily. It's just most noticeable in those you are closest to, especially after a long absence. All their annoying habits are magnified right now."

"You wouldn't be so nice if you heard the foul things they were saying."

"Such as?"

Lily shifted her head and bumped his chin before replying, "It's mean, Sev." She then lifted her head to look him in the eye. "Why would I be told that you would … I don't know. I just don't understand what they meant. If I stay friends with you that I would never be able to find a husband?"

Severus frowned, "You mean other than me?"

"What do you mean by that, Sev? No one would be interested in me, but you? Or that I'll always have you?"

Sighing in annoyance, he said, "I don't want anyone but you, Lily. I'm sure if something unfortunate happened that there'd be plenty of others for you."

Realizing he was hurt by what she asked, which is why she originally decided not to ask him, Lily put her arms around Severus and reassured, "See how crazy they are making me?"

"Was that all?" he muttered, not sure why Lily would even worry about finding another to be her husband. Wasn't everything settled between them? She had been touching and kissing him since he first asked her.

She murmured in reply, "Uh, my Divination class thinks I'm some kind of floozy, and that uh … might make them think we're more than just friends."

"That doesn't make you different from most of the other female students. They are either labeled as immoral or frigid bitches. There's no in between."

"I'd prefer nice girl, Sev."

He laughed. "At least your purported liaison is limited to one partner. Would you prefer a whole quidditch team?"

"Don't you get disgusting too. Avery was giving me looks all through class."

"Would you like him gone?"

"No, Sev," Lily replied and pulled back giving him a playful slap to the chest. "That's not something to kid around about. He didn't say anything, just was creepy looking."

"He always is."

Lily rolled her eyes and reached for the container of cranberry bars. "You didn't have one of these yet."

"I was waiting for you to offer, Lily."

She popped the lid off and replied, "Well, I'm not going to write you an invitation." Lily took one of the bars.

Rather than studying the food, Severus also took one and barely looked at it before he took a bite.

Lily asked, "Why didn't you dissect that?"

He stopped chewing, and asked in mild alarm, "Didn't you say your mother made these?"

"Yes, but what does that have to do with anything?"

"Your mother is an excellent cook, Lily."

She scoffed, "Do you think everyone else is out to poison you?"

"No," he replied, while finishing his bar. "Not intentionally."

When Lily reached for a second one, Severus did too. Trying to think about any kind of pattern, Lily could only come up with that he avoided most things that her mother bought that weren't ingredients for something else. "Are there some foods you can't eat?"

He replied by shaking his head 'no'.

"You aren't going to say, are you, Sev?"

Another shake of 'no'.

"Did you want another one?" Lily offered.

"Perhaps after Transfiguration tonight?" he suggested.

"Great idea," Lily commented and cast a charm to keep them just as fresh later, as they were now, before sealing the container back up.

"If you won't talk about food, can I ask you something else, Sev?"

"You can certainly ask, Lily."

"I'm sorry to bring up the earlier subject about what these toerags are gabbing about, but uh … in June, when uh … you know … I was told that there was something different about your … uh …" Lily was looking at the front of Severus' trousers, "and uh … I thought I overheard Healer Pye say something about an injury down there."

Severus looked at Lily with his eyebrows raised and a puzzled look on his face, before muttering, "It's old." He sighed heavily and then added, "It wouldn't prevent me, or us, from marital relations."

Lily let out a breath in relief, and said, "That's it?" Lily looked angry as she continued, "Not that there's anything pretty about any of them, but trying to take advantage of my lack of … whatever, to compare it to a hippogriff's and say it's the only asset you have."

There was really nothing that came to Severus' mind to say to this outpouring of nonsense. Any nitwit would know a hippogriff was bigger than a person, and Lily even took Magical Creatures.

Misinterpreting the look on her friend's face, Lily asked, "You think it's pretty?"

Severus rolled his eyes, "Even green, no."

A call came over the lawn to them, "Hey little snakelings, it's time to stop sunning yourselves and get over to Herbology."

It was Wilkes reminding them of the time, with Rosier walking distractedly by his side, looking off to the side.

Lily brushed herself off, and commented, "I am not in Slytherin."

"But you are green, Evans," Wilkes replied.

Rosier added, "You both look ready to show your support for the winning team tomorrow. By the way, Lupin was in the bushes over there, watching the two of you."

"What for?" Lily demanded, drawing her wand.

"Probably hiding out before Herbology. McGonagall was one mean pussy at lunch," Wilkes laughed. Without the other Marauders around, Lupin was a chicken shit. Probably just lurking around, watching. Must eat away at the Gryffindors that Evans was slumming with Snape.

"He could have been listening," Lily muttered.

Severus shrugged, "So? You were only repeating rumors to me."

"That's good to hear," Rosier said jovially. "Avery's at lunch was Snape had left a potion in your cauldron."

"Avery's tongue needs to be glued to the roof of his mouth again," Severus suggested.

************************

All-out war erupted at the Gryffindor table at lunch, and Remus knew it was all Peter's fault.

Sirius was muttering about Evans taking points from Gryffindor, and how Parkin was going to fail to keep their house competitive, when Peter arrived all giggly and informed his friends, "We're not going to have to worry about Evans anymore. Tart's breeding and about to get expelled."

Sirius cocked his head to the side. If he was ever female and pregnant, the last person he would confide in was Wormtail, even if he was the father.

"No way," James insisted. "Even if Evans was … which she isn't. There's magic over the castle to keep students from having accidents like that."

Gloating because he was so smart, Peter informed him, "But she hasn't been here in months, has she?"

Sirius and James came to the same conclusion simultaneously. Sirius got his opinion out first, "No, not greasy Snivelly. Uh, even if she's green, no. No. It's too horrible. Ugh."

After a moment of open-mouthed shock, James leaned forward across the table and punched Peter in the face.

Remus grabbed James and pulled him back as he started to jump across the table to further assault Peter. Sirius put his arm forward to push James back to his side of the table, since Remus wasn't getting the job done.

The bossy 7th year female Gryffindor prefect yelled down the table, "Sit down, you goons!"

James insisted, "Let go of me!"

Since Peter was using Sirius' taller body as a shield, Remus let go, ready to grab James again if he didn't behave himself.

They were all surprised when James dashed down the side of the table towards the other end, yelling to attract attention, "MacDonald! Parkin!"

Remus called behind him, "No, James!"

Jumping to his feet, Sirius ran after him, on his own side of the table, "Don't do it, Prongs!"

Ready to be proven right, Peter followed behind Sirius, but slower, so he would not be a target of enraged female Gryffindors when James revealed what Peter had overheard in the gents.

Sirius did not reach James in time, before both Parkin and MacDonald had stood to confront whatever James was saying. MacDonald slapped him across the face first, but then Parkin showed her friend how to do it properly from the other side, and James rocked back from the force of it. The girls around that area, pulled on the back of James' robe and he went down. Sirius slid over the table to reach his friend.

Two female Gryffindor prefects, 5th and 7th year, were calling for order, with assistance from a Ravenclaw prefect, who kept the table between him and the melee, as the other Ravenclaws in the area evacuated, and other prefects in the hall tried to maintain the peace.

After the slapping, both Rosier and Wilkes had stood and were heading over. At least Wilkes was a prefect, but Rosier wasn't opposed to getting in a couple kicks on Potter or Black to break things up. He may be a Slytherin, but he was also a gentleman who did not like ladies, whom he liked, suffering verbal abuse from foul-mouthed cretins.

Unfortunately for Evan Rosier, Prof. McGonagall was screaming at the Gryffindors and moved over to their table to start meting out punishment, while other staff told the rest of the Great Hall to settle down. Filch eagerly waited to see who would be his.

Since Remus had remained on the safe half of the Gryffindor table, with the other men looking on in horror as the feisty females of Gryffindor resorted to violence, he was a member of the first group that McGonagall sent out of the Great Hall while she attempted to clear the area of extra students.

In a daze at how ridiculous his friends had acted, Remus returned to Gryffindor tower. He decided that he better leave now. He had missed an Herbology class in September due to his little monthly problem, and would miss another next week. Remus had also skived off another Friday afternoon because his friends had their Friday afternoons free, and repeatedly urged him to skip class.

Evans was in Herbology too. Had she heard about this alarming rumor? They were actually the only two Gryffindors in that class, so Remus decided he better go to see if Evans needed anything either for Herbology or a sympathetic ear.

Remus was heading across the lawn down to the greenhouses, passing others out enjoying the last of the fine weather, when he saw Evans sitting with Snape. Their overwhelming greenness was hard to miss with them being out in the sunlight. Slowing, he realized it was a private conversation when Evans threw her arms around Snape, so he veered off towards some nearby shrubbery.

Unconcerned, since it was Evans touching Snape, rather than the other way around, Remus paused to try to sort this out. He knew they were friends. Evans told the boys repeatedly to leave Snape alone over the years. The problem was Snape was challenging for the Marauders. If he didn't fight back, and fight back well, he doubted James and Sirius would seek him out, and Peter would not crow as loudly about every hard-earned victory. They also took pleasure from planning revenge after every defeat.

From the disaster over the summer, Remus now knew they lived pretty close to each other. More than just the same train line. He wasn't sure who else lived around them, but if they weren't the same age, that could account for their seemingly odd friendship. If Remus had other witches and wizards his own age around where he lived, and didn't have the unfortunate lifelong problem of being a werewolf, he was sure he'd at least make an effort to get to know them. Evans was so nice that even a git such as Snape couldn't help but like her.

Could James have miscalculated the extent of their friendship when he set his sights on Evans? They were talking and eating, after that one embrace from Evans so maybe not romance, but for their age, for a Slytherin and a Gryffindor to be so cozy after such a long time, seemed unnatural? There was no written rule about the two houses interacting, but it seemed fiercer than any other rivalry at the school. Or was that just contrived by Remus' friends? Thinking back, Longbottom treated Slytherins fairly, but he was cautious and suspicious. However, once he caught the Marauders in enough lies, he'd usually believe anyone else first.

Remus realized he had hung about here long enough when Wilkes yelled, "Hey little snakelings, it's time to stop sunning yourselves and get over to Herbology."

Rosier was with him, and looking straight at Remus standing in the shadows. Rosier could be a problem at times, with Wilkes and Snape, a very big problem. And Remus wasn't sure about Evans being called a little snakeling. He decided he better quickly get to the greenhouse, rather than stand around looking like a tempting target.

He arrived at the greenhouse with a group of Hufflepuffs. Remus knew that nurturing plants was not the domain of just the house of badgers, since both Sirius and James could have been in this class, if they wanted. They found it boring and unnecessary. Prof. Sprout was probably relieved. All they did for five years was goof off and throw things at other students. Unfortunately Gryffindor was paired with Hufflepuff for Herbology early on. Therefore, these Hufflepuffs knew Remus only too well. Even without his three friends, Remus was pretty much left on his own. They'd rather team up with Wilkes and Rosier, smart, rich and handsome … three things that Remus couldn't lay claim to.

When the three Slytherins and Evans arrived, a couple of girls who had their eyes on the two young men, and had been partnering with them for the past month, joined them at their usual table for four. Scoping out the arrangements, Remus took a chance and approached Evans and Snape in the back. They hadn't been in class so did not have a full table prearranged. In the past, Evans was with Parkin and MacDonald.

Shyly Remus offered, "Alright Evans?"

While Evans narrowed her eyes to study Lupin, he was surprised to see Snape smirk at him. What was he up to?

Evans responded coldly, "You can join us if you can behave yourself, Lupin." Evans turned away from Lupin, Snape immediately looked attentive before she caught him smirking, and she added, "If it's alright with Severus."

"Whatever you say, Lily."

What was Snape doing with his voice? He wasn't going to fool Evans by making it sound deep and adult-like. She had heard it for years, and it was one of the reasons why 'Snivelly' fit him so much as a nickname.

Remus was thinking maybe this was a bad idea because why would Snape want him over here? However, Prof. Sprout was beginning the lesson.

Once they got to practical work, Remus saw that Snape and Evans worked well together. All their years as efficient potions partners was evident. They did not talk much, but Snape was still using that new voice whenever he needed to say something to Evans or him. Evans talked much more, and told both Snape and Remus what she wanted them to do. Unlike the Marauders in previous years, Evans was not the kind of Gryffindor who hurled manure at her classmates.

His temporary partners were also like minded when it came to the post-class sanitizing charms. Like Remus, they preferred to follow up the charms with lots of soap and water. Usually Remus had to run to catch up to James, Sirius and Peter because about half their class had felt the same, and they didn't want to wait while Remus queued up to use the sink.

Therefore, Remus found himself walking sedately back to the castle with Evans, Snape, Rosier, Wilkes and a bunch of nice Hufflepuffs, mostly girls. No jinxes, no jokes, no sly innuendos, just pleasant company. Feeling it was too good to be true, Remus stopped in the gents before returning to the tower to check if his hair, face and the rest of his appearance was normal, and then spun around to see if he had a note or sign on his backside.

Seeing nothing that he'd need to get sorted before meeting his friends, Remus headed up to the tower and found the common room and their bedroom unoccupied by the rest of the Marauders. Shrugging because it was such a nice day, Remus decided he'd head down to the quidditch pitch to look for them. They still had plenty of time before dinner.

************************

Lily returned to her room and found a note on her bed.

_Lily ~_

_Don't be bothered listening to anything the guys say. We'll be glad to serve detentions from now till graduation straightening out Potter and Pettigrew. Lying bastards!_

_Helen and Mary_

Worried, but sure she'd find out soon enough what the Marauders were up to this time, Lily decided to stay put until dinner and start on her weekend homework, in case the quidditch match went long tomorrow.

Severus and her were meeting Prof. McGonagall this evening to get caught up on Transfiguration. After that, Lily wasn't sure, but since Sev asked her to save the cranberry bars till after, maybe he had something in mind.

Helen and Mary did not return to their room before the start of dinner. Lily waited close to thirty minutes before going down, deciding that they must have headed straight there. When she entered the common room, she saw those detestable boys from this morning. They saw her too and ran out the portrait hole.

Lily spent her time on the way to the Great Hall in thought about cowardly, name-calling Gryffindors who thought the Marauders were going to protect them from any repercussions. Doesn't work very well when their saviors weren't around, and if it was someone with any backbone like Lily, having the Marauders covering their asses wasn't going to work. She'd take points from them all, no matter how they threatened her.

The Gryffindor table seemed rather terse when Lily arrived. Many of the ladies were glaring at the male end. Had the little toerags been right when they threatened more people were going to be undressed? Pretty stupid to do that since the females could enter the boys' dorms at night. But let's face it, have the Marauders ever had a smart plan? Did they ever have any plan? Only Lupin was present and he looked very determined to concentrate on his meal and nothing else.

Her friends were missing so Lily spent the meal looking around and noticed there was a pantomime being enacted on the far end of the hall, next to the Slytherin table by some younger students. A young cheeky, blond boy with a smile so wide that his blinding white teeth seemed to have been charmed, was playacting that he was threatening another who waved his hands in the air in mock fear. Severus was ignoring the display behind him, and was sitting again with Wilkes and Rosier. Mulciber was at the far end of the table with a mixed group of older Slytherins who were sitting close, whispering furiously and glaring at anyone who came close to them.

When Prof. McGonagall left, Severus stood but pointed at Lily when she stood. He headed over to a door closer to Gryffindor than Slytherin.

Lily joined him and said, "This door isn't closer to Prof. McGonagall's office."

Severus stood close to Lily and said softly, "The group Mulciber's with, that's the Dark Lord fan club you've pestered me about. Study who's in it and stay away from them."

When she looked around him, he pulled her along to exit through door, "Don't stare."

"Isn't that kind of obvious, them eating together?"

"Emergency meeting because Avery's a simpleton."

"Mulciber's not too sharp either."

"They've been trying to flatter smarter students, but if they keep looking like a gang of moronic thugs, no one listens."

"What happened?"

Severus tsk'd at her, "Lily, what happens in Slytherin is supposed to stay in Slytherin."

"Sev, that's code for you attacked someone."

He shrugged in response as they continued up the stairs. "I merely took advantage of quidditch tomorrow. Mulciber can't risk getting hurt and not playing. That's the only reason Slughorn lets him continue here."

"For quidditch?" Lily asked in disbelief.

"Certainly not because he thinks he has a promising career in the Ministry."

"Anyway, without Mulciber, Avery was not as safe as he thought. I was forced to do it in front of others so the message got out that what Avery claimed earlier today better not be repeated where I can hear it."

Lily smacked Sev on the arm. "How many times have I told you words can't hurt?"

Sighing, he replied, "You were upset earlier, Lily. If it continued, they'd have made you miserable."

"I don't care what Avery says," she said, trying to sound convincing. "And I thought you didn't like that group of youngsters following you around."

Smirking, Severus said, "I've found some use for them."

"Sev!"

"No, nothing like that. I need to wash that potion off my skin and scalp in the morning, and some of them keep lookout. Usually attacking others in the bath is considered bad form, but nonetheless it's effective."

Lily frowned. Attacking others in the bath bad form? Severus' paranoia knew no limits at times. Though as her mother said, it takes days to develop a habit. Sev might get into the custom of washing his hair without Lily nagging due to the greasy potion he was still using. She was on a milder version that rubbed in as a cream after bathing, and her scalp was not a problem. Sev's had been covered as much as the rest of his skin with blisters.

They weren't as quick at Transfiguration as they were at Charms. Though Lily thought Severus was goofing around because he kept making his item match her final version for anything conjured. She conjured a pink, dainty, perfectly patterned butterfly, and then Severus would have a blue one, just like it, in a couple minutes. Why couldn't he just grow up and concentrate on what they were supposed to be learning here?

Growing annoyed, Lily cast _rictusempra _in a low whisper when Prof. McGonagall stepped out for a moment.

Rather than the laughter she expected, Lily snuck a glance to see Severus shudder then twitch a bit before he said, "_Finite Incantatem_." His objects disappeared, but Severus continued to twitch slightly as he looked at her. "A new kind of itching jinx, Lily? It had an additional crawling sensation to go with it. Nice one."

Dissatisfied, Lily went back to the current conjuration, and produced a long stemmed, thorn free, perfect white rose. Severus produced a number of lilies in different colors, including unnatural shades of blue and green, in addition to red, orange, pink and white. When he handed them to her, she muttered, "Show off." He then quickly produced a succession of roses in red, blue, purple and black for her. Lily insisted, "Mine's still better."

"I didn't say it wasn't. Quality over quantity," Severus intoned while tilting his head in her direction.

As Prof. McGonagall entered, he returned to his now empty desk. McGonagall asked, "How about you produce one, Mr. Snape, and then we'll call it a night. We can meet again next week."

With a flick of his wand, Severus produced a dandelion, including the long root still with a clump of dirt attached to it.

"Excellent detail, Mr. Snape."

Severus smirked at Lily, who felt her white rose was superior. It was just crowded with all the rubbish Sev had left over on her desk. In protest, she vanished all but her rose.

Lily received a nod from Prof. McGonagall, since she was intentionally waving around her rose when it failed to receive praise equaling Severus' weed.

Dejected, Lily said, "Good night, Professor. Thank you for your help."

Severus muttered, "Thanks," from behind her.

Exiting the classroom, Lily asked, "Where to now? We have time before curfew."

"Whatever you want, Lily."

"I already started on my homework so I'm good there."

"Did you want to go up near Ravenclaw and sit in one of the windows there?"

"Ravenclaw?"

"That tower has the best view, and the corridors off of it have wide window sills."

"And here I thought you never left the dungeons, Sev. Lead on."

"There is plenty of room in the corridors down there, but there's always someone lurking about or looking for their own place to be left alone."

After they reached the corridor out of the main stairwell, Severus turned left. "Straight would lead to their common room, and if we make another turn here, this hallway dead ends after a couple curves."

"Where does this door go?"

"I don't check it every time, but it's been locked. This window overlooks the mountains, which is better during the day, but the last one is over the main part of the castle, which has the lights at night."

"There's another door. Why don't you unlock them?"

"Why don't you?" Severus asked as he put his bag down, and sat on the window sill turning to face the corridor they just came out of.

"Maybe when I get bored," Lily replied as she sat on the sill too, and then swung her feet up. Severus held her off for a moment, shifted to mirror her from his side, then guided her to settle her legs on top of his, and her feet between the window and his body.

Lily really hadn't come for the view, but it was quite nice. The Ravenclaws must have the best view out of all of them, since Slytherin and Hufflepuff were downstairs. Unless you counted the lads' opinion because you could see the quidditch pitch from their tower. Boys!!!

This was rather clever of Severus. They were facing each other, but they were separated by the length of their legs. Lily could only touch Sev from about his knee down without leaning forward.

"Been coming here long?"

Severus shrugged. He had found this spot early on, and had waited years to get Lily here. He also cast a few notice-me-nots over time over both sections of the corridor to keep snoggers and shaggers out of here. They usually preferred poorly lit areas, but the lack of traffic here was too tempting to those that actually took the time to plan out their rendezvous.

Lily put her hand on his knee and asked, "How have you been feeling?" The silence of the corridor made her notice the noise Severus was making. She was used to his respiratory racket from the hospital, and it had decreased.

"Well enough to cast spells. And you?"

"Better than you. Going to quidditch tomorrow?"

"No, arithmancy."

"How could you be behind in that, Sev?"

"Prof. Abstractus asked to meet with me. I should go. He's the only teacher that thinks I'm anything special, so I might as well let him stroke my ego."

"You are super at Defense," Lily asserted, avoiding the topic of Slughorn.

"By the time an instructor realizes I'm not trash, Lily, he or she is leaving."

"You're not trash, Sev," Lily assured him while rubbing his bony knee.

Reaching down for her hand, he reminded her, "Patting only. You're irritating it."

Well, that explained why the tickling charm failed earlier, thought Lily. Unless Sev wasn't ticklish? Hmm. She guessed she'd have to wait until his skin got better before examining that more closely.

Sighing, Lily suggested, "Maybe we should just skip ahead to the kissing. I don't want to rush it too close to curfew."

Severus was trying to figure out if Lily was kidding around. They had at least twenty minutes before they needed to head back to their common rooms. He also did not want to immediately associate this hallway with kissing on their first visit. That's not why he found it.

Lily sliding her feet back to change positions was the sign that she meant it, or at least that she intended to do something. Severus stayed still so they didn't end up getting annoyed at each other being in the way. His legs against the window were as out of the way as they could get, unless he got up.

This suited Lily just fine as she moved in, slid her hands along Severus' sides then continued to snake them up his back, letting one reach his neck as she tightened her embrace, and pressed her lips against his while allowing her eyes to close. Her feet could not go anywhere since she was in a kneeling position on the sill. Neither leg could flex back at the knee, but her toes could still curl in her shoes. Lily didn't remember the toe curling in the hospital, and had thought that perhaps their kissing had gotten too commonplace. This new position was rather good for her because her head was higher than his, and she felt more in control, not that Severus usually fought back, but Lily liked the additional sensation of being in charge.

Good, but it could be better, Lily contemplated as she noticed that his lips were dry. Alright if she didn't move her lips, but she liked moving them. Shifting her hand on his neck higher into his hair, she licked Severus' lips so they'd have some moisture.

When Lily licked his lips, Severus was torn. He didn't want her licking him, but it was Lily so there was nothing wrong with her tongue, or any other part of her. Severus had given Lily's body a lot of thought. It was obvious from Mulciber's vast collection of pornographic material that witches enjoyed the attention of other witches a lot more than they did wizards, but they weren't doing anything that he couldn't do to please Lily. It was just reconciling in his mind that there was nothing about Lily that could possibly displease or repulse him, rather than thinking about how skanky the witches were in the pictures.

Trying to tell Lily that he didn't like this resulted in her tongue getting into his mouth. As he pushed her to stop this from turning into snogging, Lily tightened her hold on him and instead of removing her tongue, started feeling his tongue with hers.

Lily didn't know why Severus thought her licking his lips meant she wanted to snog, but thought why not when her tongue gained entrance. It was odd touching someone else's teeth with her tongue, and the feeling of his tongue as she felt it was … oh, even though this was probably a muggle term it definitely fit ... electrifying. Is this why everyone snogged? She wished Severus wouldn't get so squirmy as she pressed against him to use her weight to keep him still. It was distracting, and Lily was trying to investigate how much better than brilliantly great this could feel. Why didn't Sev open his mouth sooner?

Pushing at Lily's arms just made her tighten her hold and seemed to encourage her further as she straddled his lap. His arm facing the hallway remained free, but tugging at her ankle didn't help from this angle. His other hand was trapped between them and ended up on Lily's breast. It might stay there until she decided to stop trying to push him through the stone wall. Severus worked the free hand upwards. Dislodging her knee did occur to him, but he was afraid from her positioning that could result in her full weight falling onto his nads. Lily's thigh seemed to go on too far when he finally reached … her knickers. His hand left her body so fast, it was as if he was burnt.

That wasn't the only burning because Lily finally disengaged from his mouth to moan, "More Sev." While resuming her probing of his mouth, she wriggled suggestively on his lap and purposely rubbed her chest against his trapped hand that was going numb.

Panicking, Severus tricked Lily by pushing back with his tongue to get her out of his mouth long enough for him to croak out, "Curfew."

Lily moaned her disappointment, but after all she was a prefect and needed to set a good example. She wasn't on the patrol schedule yet so she had no legitimate reason to miss curfew. However, Lily wanted to know what came next. She could feel it in her body that there was just so much more to do, even if it was just kissing Severus and exploring his mouth till the sun dawned tomorrow morning.

Rather than cutting off suddenly, Lily gave Severus a close-mouthed kiss on the lips. She then put her hand on his face. "You feel flushed, but the green hides it. How about me?"

"Fine."

Climbing off Severus, Lily asked, "Cranberry bar for the walk back, Sev?"

"Maybe not," he replied. Severus couldn't start and stop as quickly as Lily could, but right now he needed to make sure she did not start with the kissing again. He stood and gave her room to grab her bag.

Reaching the Ravenclaw corridor, Lily said, "When will I see you tomorrow?"

"Library after breakfast?"

"Alright," she agreed as they parted ways at the stairs. Severus was heading down to Slytherin, and Gryffindor was up.

On her way upstairs, Lily felt her face and her lips with her hand, feeling that how she felt and what she just did were written all over her. Unlike Petunia's description, being with Severus did not feel the least bit wicked or depraved. It was quite the opposite.

She arrived to find a bunch of morose looking boys hanging in the Gryffindor common room. The Marauders were absent and not providing entertainment to the young lads on a Friday evening. Toerags were probably emptying the school's larders at this very moment to arrange for a historical food fight. Lily hesitated on the stairs up to the girls' dormitories. What if they ran into Severus? Kitchens were near Hufflepuff, but there was no guarantee that that's where they were heading. They could just as easily headed down to the dungeons to catch any Slytherins heading back close to curfew to delay them enough to cause trouble. For some reason, any infractions by Potter, Black, Lupin and Pettigrew for not being in the tower on time were ignored, and always had been, no matter what they were caught doing. It had long been suspected that one of them was Dumbledore's relative or godchild, in addition to two of them being wealthy purebloods.

Muttering about the unfairness displayed here at the school, Lily dragged herself upstairs and found her two roommates already washed up and in their pajamas.

"Lily, where've you been all day?"

"Me?" she asked in reply. "Uh, since I saw you earlier, or this evening when I was catching up with Prof. McGonagall for Transfiguration?"

"You just disappeared before lunch, and then Potter was shooting his mouth off in the Great Hall. We didn't get the whole story till later, when Black was trying to make their lame ass excuses," Helen said while rolling her eyes at how ridiculous those boys were.

Mary added, "We had plenty of time to talk it over while we were dusting in the trophy room. What that place really needs is to be cleared out a bit. There's plaques in there that are over a hundred years old. Even if their descendants were attending Hogwart's today, they'd never find them behind all the others."

"Anyway," Helen interrupted, "it seems that in retaliation for you taking points from some Gryff lads this morning that were under the protection of sainted Potter, that they felt it only right to be a couple of berks and go spreading around tales about you, Lily. Stupid pisshead came down to our end of the table talking trash, and we all put an immediate end to it."

"Too bad McGonagall came to his rescue. We had him and Black on the floor."

"You attacked Potter and Black?"

"Every girl that could reach them, but the prefects. We stick together and when some prick starts telling tales about you being expelled for being pregnant, we'll set him straight," Helen stated with conviction.

"Could that have something to do with Divination?"

Mary exclaimed, "It was only a dream, Lily. And as we were told, it shows that you aren't afraid to put your dreams into words and interpret them as they are. Rather juvenile to use you're doing well in class, and twisting it into something like that."

"Petty Potter" Helen said, practically ready to spit fire.

"This is all getting out of control. We're supposed to work together as a house and a family here at school," Lily replied, once again trying to think of something that would solve this whole ridiculous mess. Now that the Marauders were encouraging the younger lads to misbehave, it was obvious they had no intention of reconciliation.

Helen shrugged, "They started it, and there's no reasoning with them. You think they fear any kind of punishment after all the times they were allowed to do whatever they wanted?"

"Don't worry, Lily," Mary assured her. "There are plenty of other people here at school that feel the same way. We had a chance to talk to Malcolm while Evan sweet talked Mrs. Norris, or rather made a nuisance of himself to the cat."

"Yeah, he showed up and magicked the trophies to a brilliant shine so we could get out of there tonight, rather than next week."

"Very sweet of him," Mary said with a small smile.

"And Evan, talking to Mrs. Norris the whole time," Helen said with a grin of her own.

"So, we told Malcolm that unless he and Evan accept us and who are friends are, rather than listening to Mulciber telling them what to do, then they might as well start dating Mulciber."

Lily laughed. They probably didn't give the boys an ultimatum like they described, but it was nice of them to bring it up when they should just be thankful that someone showed up to help.

"So they better get their act together by next week, or we'll make other plans for Hogsmeade."

"By the way, were the big mouths back from their punishment when you came through the common room?"

"I don't know," Lily said. "They weren't there."

"If they were back, they'd be down there telling their version of things. Bunch of cowardly liars. How did they ever get into Gryffindor?"

Lily shrugged, she had questioned that many times in her own mind. Perhaps the Sorting Hat saw the potential for them to be brave, rather than the way then the way they acted every day.

As she got ready for bed, she continued trying to think of a way that Gryffindor house could reunite. Those four boys were … a disease. At first, it appeared like all fun and laughs, and then their behavior ate away at everything. Breaking rules, not caring about grades, mocking authority figures, bullying everyone around them, and then being idolized by the same lads who they tormented in the showers.

If they had a weak point, it had to be Lupin. He could act normal when he wasn't with the others. Seemed pleasant enough in Herbology today. At least he had brains enough to realize Severus had been ill, and didn't mutter taunts at either of them during class. Did he dare to have any other classes without his mates? Lily had been to every class but Magical Creatures now, and remembered Potter thought it jolly good that they were in the class together. Probably because it was a walk outside where he could get a clear shot and jinx the heck out of someone. What a toerag.

Maybe Severus had a class with him. That would be Ancient Runes or Arithmancy? But what would she ask her friend to do? Lily didn't even know if Severus could fake friendliness. He either was insulting or moodily quiet.

After wishing her roommates good night, since they were already in bed but doing some reading, Lily lay down and arranged the bed curtains to curtail the remaining light from bothering her.

Severus. Hm, well, he certainly was no spy. He could keep quiet, but pretending he liked someone that he didn't? Probably not, or else he'd have been more successful here at Hogwart's in the friend department. Maybe he'd feel comfortable with those younger Slytherins, if they didn't lose interest in him. Being older than them might give him a bit of confidence.

Lily felt along the back of her leg, slowly ghosting the path Severus' hand took from her knee up her thigh earlier this evening. Did 'more' involve getting undressed or him getting his hands under her clothes? She had caught enough couples to know that being dressed did not mean being decent.

Between them, they had enough self-control not to turn into some writhing and panting couple copping feels in the halls. Where did students who could maintain some public decorum go? Tales of breaking into Mr. Filch's broom closets were rife, but that didn't sound the least bit romantic. When Lily was added back onto the prefect patrol schedule, she'd have to keep an eye out.

She cleared her mind as she ran one finger under the leg band of her knickers, slowly following it from her hip over her bum and then back to her hip, and repeated it with growing enjoyment. It felt provocative and like it was just crossing the line into forbidden territory. Severus should have done this. How would it feel different if Severus were doing this? Would Lily notice the longer, thinner fingers, or would they feel rather the same? He'd be cautious, and it would be slower and almost teasing. Lighter touch too. Barely enough, but certainly enough to let her know he'd breached her knickers. What if he didn't stop? Lily let her finger continue to the center, rather than sliding it back to her hip. Hmm, no, maybe this wasn't a good idea, unless she clearly defined how far his hand was to go. Disappointed that this idea turned out to be no good, Lily stopped goofing around with the back leg band of her panties.

His other hand had been on her chest, but he hadn't done anything. Boys were supposed to squeeze them, right? With a quick glance to make sure she couldn't be seen in bed, even under the covers, Lily put a hand on each of her breasts, and tried to imitate what she guessed the errant lads she had caught were doing under girls' blouses. She felt something, but it wasn't as nice as the hand on her leg. She must be doing something wrong. The fondled ladies were usually squirming in pleasure with their eyes closed while wriggling their bums against the fellow behind them. Lily felt no urge to squirm or wriggle. Not even slightly.

Where was she supposed to touch Severus back? Knowing him, he'd say nowhere. Even with the randiest couples, short of actually shagging, the bloke's clothes were usually intact. Maybe his front was undone, but in most cases the girl was touching it through the trousers. Tonight, Lily hadn't done that. Was that why Severus only teased her by touching the outside of her knickers, and not doing something with her breast? Lily had felt the kiss itself had been certainly attention grabbing. Maybe next time, if Severus wouldn't talk about what he liked, she'd try it.

************************

Down in the dungeons, Severus was also replaying his kiss with Lily over in his mind. It was inevitable that their tongues would end up in the other's mouth. After Lily's revelation about her sister's argument, he hoped it would have taken longer. From everything she had said, Lily wanted to be friends who held hands and kissed, with closed mouths. Barring that one time in the hospital when she was being childish, and wanted Severus to pull down his trousers for her. They were a bit old to be playing doctor, healer, or whatever she wanted to call it.

He'd let her look once after they were married, and then any time he needed to disrobe after that, it would be in the dark. Lily already knew that he'd been injured more than most people, so it wasn't as if he was trying to trick her. She already got enough of a look back in June. Lily used the word 'pretty' earlier today. Severus had never claimed anything about him was even tolerable looking. He wouldn't lie to Lily about what he looked like. She knew, and was still his friend. That's why he loved her. There wouldn't be anyone else that he'd ever love as much as Lily.

Turning to get comfortable, now that he'd finished smearing this potion all over, Severus thought he overheard something outside the drapery he had pulled closed around his bed. He glared out the crack between the panels, but Mulciber was laying there quietly. He knew better than to wank like he was the only one in the room again. Mulciber's current reading material was so outrageous anyway. It had no semblance to real life. Raped witches would scream and cry just as much as raped muggles. They wouldn't suddenly decide they enjoyed it after a wizard stuck it in them.

************************

Peter, James and Sirius returned to Gryffindor tower long after curfew, but it was from supervised hard labor under the watchful eye of Filch. The founders of this crap pile had no idea of how to do things the easy way. Wizards don't need pipes and septic systems, although all three of their homes did have plumbing. There was nothing as disgusting as what they were put to work cleaning down in the sub-dungeon. Probably why the Slytherins stank so much.

Not being presentable, all three headed to wash up, rather than getting sidetracked in the common room by the younger students who had stayed late to wait for them.

This situation was going to take some analysis and careful planning. Sirius already had his day planned tomorrow polishing doorknobs thanks to that filthy Snivelly. Peter couldn't say for sure who started the Evans is pregnant rumor since he was in a stall, but it could have been Snape. That would be so like him. Sneaky Slytherin.

They were still discussing their favorite bane when they entered their room, wearing nothing but towels, leaving all their clothing behind for the house elves to deal with.

"They are going to have to scrub holes in those robes," Peter laughed.

"No, they'll just use Mrs. Scower's All-Purpose Magical Mess Remover," Sirius said while waving his hand, "that even gets the slime off Snape."

"Not without a few _Scourgify_s for good measure," James added. "Mrs. Scower is tough, but there's some things that go beyond 'magical mess'."

"Where have you three been?" Remus asked. No one seemed to know after they were turned over to Filch at lunch.

James said, "Ah, now that's quite the question now, isn't it, Moony?"

Peter exaggeratedly shuddered, and answered, "It was horrible … deep in the dungeons, where Snivellus spawned from."

Barking a laugh, Sirius added, "Don't worry, Moony. That is definitely not worth adding to the map. The corridor should be filled in so nothing else ever crawls out of there again."

"What did Snape have to do with your momentary insanity at lunch, Prongs?"

Shrugging, James said, "Maybe nothing. Maybe everything."

Deflecting that he was the cause of it, Peter insisted, "He's very tricky, Moony. Can't trust him, even when you don't see him. If it wasn't him, it was one of the other Death Eaters."

Nodding, Sirius said, "Yup, I'd bet on Death Eaters."

"You're not serious – and I mean S E R I O U S in this case, Padfoot – that you think Death Eaters started a rumor that Evans was pregnant?"

"Why not?" asked James warming to the idea. "Who else would gain from discrediting a muggleborn like Evans?"

"And Snape is definitely one of them," Peter said with certainty.

"Stop," Remus interjected. "Listen to yourselves. We all know that Snape and Evans are friends. Even if you don't like it. Why would he be involved with some death eater plot to start a stupid rumor?"

"That's the beauty of it, Moony," Sirius knowingly uttered. "He's faking being her friend so no one suspects. You know how nice Evans is. How many chances has she given Prongs here without hexing his bollocks off?"

"Oy Padfoot! I need those to make little Potters."

"You'll never need them, mate, until you find yourself a girl that you don't dissolve into a puddle for. If I were Evans, I call you a prick and just whisk them away. You'd get the message then, Prongs," clarified Sirius.

"Evans likes me. She likes me a lot," James said with absolute conviction. "Evans is only a bit self-conscious right now because she's green and got all those things on her face."

"Self-conscious?" spat Peter. "Evans is hideous and she knows it."

"Take that back!"

Exasperated, Remus yelled, "Cut it out!"

"What?" yelled Sirius back.

"You're all acting dense, self-absorbed and just all-around blockheads. You got to apologize, even if it's against Marauder policy."

Peter sneered, "Without our policy, we ain't the Marauders. Chickening out, Moony?"

"Hey now," Sirius interjected. "We are not fighting over some girl. Even if Moony and Prongs have gone soft in the head."

James was thinking he knew who Remus meant, so waited to hear more before judging.

"Evans. How do you think she felt when Prongs spread this untrue rumor in such a spectacular fashion?"

"I didn't start it," James clarified for anyone that got the idea that he'd say such a thing about Evans.

"And she wasn't there," Sirius said smugly.

"Oh, you think your assailants wouldn't bother telling her?"

"Filthy snitches," Peter called the Gryffindor ladies.

"Just to get you caught up, I have Herbology with Evans after lunch."

"So you sorted her?" James asked hopefully.

"No, she was with Snape. And you know what? I think they're a lot closer than you all think."

"Ugh ..."

"Not like that," Remus corrected. "They are good friends. Like you are with me. She probably tells him everything."

"Ewww," Sirius said. "Who wants a girl doing all that talking? That's what they have girlfriends for."

"Thank goodness," Peter added.

Looking puzzled, James shook his head. "No. Evans is too smart to be friends with Snivelly. And being a girl wouldn't she want him to share back? What's he got? How great the Death Eaters and Dark Arts are?"

"Yeah, she's got Parkin and MacDonald, for what they're worth," Peter said disdainfully. None of them showed any interest in him. Stupid bitches.

Sighing loudly, Remus put his hand to his forehead before explaining, "You are looking at this all the wrong way. Step back like you don't even know Evans and Snape. They live close and knew each other even before Hogwart's."

"He was an ugly oddball then too. The only thing that's changed is his nose has gotten bigger and he's gotten even greasier," Sirius said, not understanding why Remus was even trying to make Snape sound normal.

"Yeah, Dark Arts," James declared and pointed his finger at Remus. "And even little Evans was too good looking to hang around with him."

Throwing his hands in the air, Remus said, "This isn't about looks."

"There, there, Moony," intoned Peter. "We know that's what you need to tell the ladies to get their attention since you aren't as naturally good-looking as us, but there's only so much that acting sensitive and being a good listener can cover up."

"That hair."

"Those teeth."

"The grease."

"That nose."

"Those eyes."

"That smell."

"Those hands."

"That slime."

"All of him."

"Fine. I tried," Remus said finally.


	27. Chapter 27 I see London, I see France

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 27 I see London, I see France

With things sorted between the three girls, Lily Evans, Mary MacDonald and Helen Parkin, they went to breakfast together as they usually did on a Saturday morning. Helen would have to go early to the pitch because she was captain of the Gryffindor quidditch team, despite efforts to have her replaced by the banned James Potter prior to the first game of the year even being played.

Mary planned to spend the spare time before the match in the library getting them both library books for History. Both Helen and Mary had continued to take that course with Prof. Binns.

As they were leaving the Great Hall, three Slytherin boys intercepted them outside the doors. Malcolm Wilkes, Evan Rosier, and a reluctantly following Severus Snape, still very green and pockmarked.

Evan said, "Wanted to catch you ladies before today's game. You might not want to talk to us later."

"We'll see," Helen replied, confident that her team would be the victor.

"You sounded rather serious last night," Malcolm said. "If you weren't just saying that to get me to polish faster …"

"Oh no, Malcolm," replied Mary with sincerity.

"Good. We three would like to invite you all to Hogsmeade next week."

"What did you have in mind?" Helen asked.

Lily crossed her arms, and pretended not to be looking at Severus. This was one way around the girls' ultimatum, to get their ugly, green friend, Lily, a date too. Lily had not told her girlfriends that she intended to go to Hogsmeade with Severus. He was pretending he did not want to go anywhere with anyone from that suffering expression on his face, and the dispirited attitude that infused his world-weary posture.

"Well, we have not formalized an itinerary yet, Helen. Did you have someplace special in mind?" Evan asked.

"Maybe," Helen replied. "We'll need to talk it over first before accepting."

"Would till tomorrow evening be sufficient time?" Malcolm inquired.

"Yes, see you at our usual table in the library after dinner?"

"Absolutely," Malcolm replied, and he and Evan went towards the front door of the castle.

Without even looking at her, Severus asked, "Are we still going to the library this morning, Evans?"

"Can I meet you up there, Sev?"

He nodded and turned to head for the stairs.

Once he was out of earshot, Mary commented, "Is that the way his voice is going to sound from now on?"

"Yeah, I did write that, didn't I?"

"You never mentioned what an improvement it was," Helen explained. "Don't know if his looks will get any better, but I would not mind him reading to me now."

Mary giggled, "Yeah, kind of deep and sexy now."

"Silky and dark."

"Stop," Lily exclaimed. Why did they have to pick on her friend?

"Alright. Alright. We have to give some thought to the terms of our acceptance. They could have tried a little harder than getting Snape for you, Lily."

"Severus is fine."

"Well, yeah, we all know the allowances you make for him, Lily. Right moody git, if you ask me. Maybe you can take him off somewhere and lose him? He'll be a real downer next week."

"Maybe I'll just stick with him. You know, if you two are on like a serious date, wouldn't it be a little odd to have either one of us around?"

Mary frowned, "Well, we don't want to ditch you, Lily. Our talk with the boys was more about in the library in the evening."

"I won't feel ditched, if I have Severus for company."

Making a face, Helen moaned, "Oh, Lily. You're making us feel bad. Tell you what, once your skin is better, we'll fix you up on a real date for Hogsmeade."

"Will you just stop picking on Severus? I know he's not here to overhear you, but I really do enjoy his friendship."

Both of them rolled their eyes at Lily. No one in their right mind would want Severus Snape's moody and insulting companionship … unless he would do their homework for them, and not expect something in return. Certainly wouldn't want to be seen with him anywhere public, even before he was all dragonpox'd.

On their way to the library, after wishing Helen luck, Lily said, "You know, Mary, maybe you and Helen ought to consider how you treat Severus. You want your friends to be nice to me. Why can't you at least not talk about him in negative terms?"

"Because it seems you're willing to overlook all his flaws, Lily."

"I'm flawed to Malcolm and Evan."

"That's only because they haven't taken the time to get to know you."

Lily turned her head to glare at Mary by her side. Helen and Mary's letter over the summer was the most direct communication they had had with Severus that she could think of.

When they entered the library, Lily found Severus at the table for two that they had used earlier in the week. He already had pulled Defense books for them to work on that class assignment. Mary and Helen both took that class too.

"Hey Sev," Lily said before touching his arm. "Mary's going to need to work on that too, and perhaps check some of those books out so Helen can do that assignment later."

"Hmm," he replied, without even looking towards Mary. "I can look up some things and take notes, if you want these for the three of you tonight."

"No, maybe we can move to a larger table together?"

Severus looked up at Lily, confused. Since when did he get invited to sit with the other Gryffinor girls? They had to know that the invitation for next weekend did not come from him. A glance at Mary's sour face showed him that this was solely Lily's idea.

It did occur to him to suggest they take one of the other empty tables on either side of his, but that would probably lead to Lily sitting with MacDonald, rather than him. If he moved, he'd either end up sitting next to or across from Lily. "Alright," Severus replied without displaying enthusiasm, packing up what he had removed from his bag.

Lily picked up some of the Defense books and said, "Lead the way, Mary."

Mary MacDonald intentionally chose a recessed table for four, and then seated herself in the back. She better get a sterling Defense grade for this homework.

Once they were settled, Lily and Severus wasted no time and got right to work discussing the assignment and referencing their supporting facts. If Mary didn't look at Snape, his voice made her momentarily forget his looks. Lily and him were a couple of swots, but they were doing all the work while Mary just made notes to write her essay later.

Lily was happy that Mary didn't complain about Severus sitting with them. Perhaps she'd realize how valuable he was, when it came to doing homework.

Not caring what Lily wanted to review, Severus went along with her discussion and shared books with Lily while they sat closely next to each other.

When their Defense assignment was completely revised, Mary suggested they start on Charms before lunch. She had that class with them too.

*************************

When Lily and Mary returned to their common room to get ready for lunch, then the match, there was a gaggle of students around the bulletin board complaining. One of the younger students asked the first prefect she saw, "Evans, what's this about us doing a class on a Sunday?"

Lily said, "Excuse me," to get a look at the notice for herself.

There was a separate time scheduled for 6th and 7th years, 5th years, 4th and 3rd years, and then a last class scheduled with 1st and 2nd years for an hour each tomorrow afternoon in the Infirmary. The only information was that it was 'Mandatory'.

"Well, it doesn't say. Perhaps Prof. McGonagall will make a verbal announcement?"

*************************

Severus felt Prof. Abstractus was making something out of nothing. He had started with widely accepted substitutions for his equations. After he exhausted those, for a challenge, Severus chose more difficult substitutions that had no basis in fact, like freely donated unicorn blood. If the blood was taken by force, it would be disastrous for whoever imbibed it. Due to the complexity of the substitution, the equations were hypothetical and only suggested possible substances, when prepared a certain way that could fit into the formula as a solution that could be solved as many different substitutions. His suggestions were not definitive since ingredients could be prepared to meet the numerical equivalents, and was therefore infinite.

"So, with your permission, Severus, I'd like to send him more of your work."

"It's a waste of time. If there were substitutions, they'd already be using them."

Shaking his head, Prof. Abstractus replied, "It will take great deal of experimentation to determine if any will lead to positive results. There's a great number of variables that can lead to a mathematical match, but not a magical one."

"There's nothing revolutionary about what I did."

"Oh no. You have an innate grasp of interactions, Severus. You eliminated many of the possible substances that would fit mathematically," he explained while holding up Severus' notes.

Skeptical because no one ever thought highly of Severus not 'following the directions' before, Severus uttered, "I'd rather not."

"You underestimate yourself. I've already talked to your head of house. Prof. Slughorn says you only aspire to being a janitor, grounds keeper, or some other profession in the magical maintenance field. I think you have more potential than you give yourself credit for. You attained more OWLs than many of your classmates.

Severus never had any career discussion with Slughorn. So Slughorn thought he was only qualified for cleaning toilets? Not a surprise.

Some dunderheaded Yank, that Severus had never heard of, wanted to waste his time experimenting with his equations? Severus would prefer to do it himself, but Slughorn was not permitting it. Post-Hogwart's, Severus did not know where he'd get access to equipment and ingredients, but he could always do more calculations, if all these failed. If any of these turned into something promising, Abstractus said he already had agreement from this other bloke to give Severus some credit if anything was published. With publication came some recognition, depending on how big a discovery it was. Severus had been trying to think of how to get future recommendations, seeing how Slughorn was against him, and Defense teachers had not a dedicated bone in their bodies.

Shrugging, Severus agreed,"Whatever you think best, Professor." He was already thinking about Lovegood's offer. He didn't pay, but he was interested in some of Severus' ideas with the intent of publishing. The Quibbler wasn't The Daily Prophet, or even Witch Weekly However, Severus knew his unpopular views would find an audience.

One of those little Slytherins following him around was Bartemius Crouch's son. He was the head of Magical Law Enforcement that allowed the Ministry use of Unforgivables. The Daily Prophet had been short on the details. When were they allowed to be used? What record was kept of their use? If it was not through self-reporting, could it be used to track down others who used the spells in Great Britain? If so, how could they tell what it was cast on? Severus had cast the killing curse on bugs and small animals. The law only covered humans, both muggle and wizard, and other beings with human-like intelligence, like goblins, centaurs, merpeople, vampires, werewolves and even giants.

*************************

Lily and Mary ended up disappointed by the match. Helen and the team were doing well, and that sneaky Slytherin seeker caught the snitch and won the game.

They had been more worried about Helen, but when they got back to the Tower to wait for her, Pettigrew was being a real big toerag amongst a sumptuous feast in their common room that involved more food than was served in the Great Hall on September 1st.

"If James was playing, we would have won the game. He wouldn't have let some slimy Slytherin get the snitch before him."

Punctuating that, a bowlful of red gelatin that had been hurled upwards minutes earlier, peeled off the ceiling and showered those that had just entered the common room, including Lily and Mary. Lily looked up and saw more food stuck and waiting to rain down.

"Grow up!" Lily called out. "Potter played a chaser before he got banned. Chasers don't catch snitches."

"Evans," Potter replied in a friendly manner. Obviously she didn't know all a chaser did during a quidditch match, because she only heard strategy from Parkin. "Wormtail was just talking."

"What kind of nickname is Wormtail anyway? Born with a gerbil tail, Pettigrew? Is that why you can't sit on a broom?"

Peter sputtered, "Oh, like uh … you think a toad like you can fly?" How dare someone insult him.

"Hey!" James cried.

"Stuff it, Prongs," Sirius replied. Couldn't let some girl insult a Marauder, even if it was Peter.

Mary asked, "Prongs? You use a fork to comb your hair, Potter?"

Lily and some of the others started to laugh. "No," replied James indignantly. James frowned. They were laughing at his hair, even Evans? He spent a lot of time on it, and it showed. Every morning and evening, he spent some quality time with the mirror and his wand. Never one spot on his teen face. Ever. Clean-shaven, pleasant smelling, teeth flossed and brushed, and just a hint of a rebellious sideburn to complement the rest of his carefully coiffed hair.

"What's gotten into you, Evans?"

Jabbing her finger in their direction, Lily said, "Maybe I'm tired of these messes, and hearing all your talking. Always blaming others when you lose our house more points in one week, then could possibly be made up in one quidditch match. Why don't you all start pulling your weight around here, and help Gryffindor?"

"Yo, Evans, you cost our house points too. Miss Prefect," Sirius sneered.

"No one could get to class because your little groupies were crying on the stairwell when you didn't wave 'hi' to them. Being a prefect does not mean I have to wipe your noses and arses for you lot."

Not realizing that Lily was being sarcastic, James explained, "You little guys got to realize that those stairs are crowded in the morning. We didn't see you. Nothing to cry over. We'll see you back here later."

"Prongs!" corrected Sirius, "It was Snape that jinxed their noses to let loose a river of snot that flowed down the stairs. Not you ignoring them."

"Ewwww," James replied. Now if it had been Snape's nose, the dungeons would still be flooded with mucus. He'd have to check into that.

"Once again, you are lying, Black," Lily said calmly.

"I never!"

"Can't you just go to your room, Evans? They shouldn't let you girls out when its your time of month." Peter complained. Remus, Sirius and James wished they were still talking about bogies because the common room erupted in a predictable fashion.

Amongst the raining and thrown food, there were many comments made. Evans was called a jolly green bitch and more female problems were attributed to explain her current crabby disposition. Mary MacDonald was called some rather unkind things, but because her mouth was running non-stop she didn't hear any of them. The nickname of Padfoot was defined as a petty, lying thief, and Remus defended his nickname of Moony did not mean he dropped his trousers and gave his hairy bum a good public airing for fun. And who told about his furry backside?

*************************

By dinner, Lily was ready to chew and spit nails. Their common room was totally trashed. Again! And they had lost the game, so they couldn't even label the reason for getting all that food as a celebration. And those toerags, Lily was seriously considering joining the female group that was forming to raid the boys' dorms while they slept.

Afterwards, she sought out Severus. She was tired of all the immature Gryffindor crap.

He did what she really appreciated about Severus; he listened to it all, or at least all Lily was willing to tell him.

Severus felt Lily's capacity to continue dealing with people she had nothing in common with, and that went out of their way to harass her, was the cause of all her problems. There was nothing new about her complaints. The Gryffindor boys were disrespectful slobs who would gladly defend their right to make their common room into their putrid lair. They only stopped short of sitting around in their underwear. They did not bother to cover up how much they scratched their privates and bums, and then stuck their fingers in either their noses or ears before returning to eating with those same unwashed fingers, while amusing themselves with breaking wind and belching during their never ending discussion of quidditch.

Even with his limited experience, Severus knew that this behavior would not endear any lad to a young lady. He may have been raised without much supervision, but he was aware of manners and the proper way to act. It was his intentional choice not to spend his life kissing arse for inane conversation from a bunch of fickle dunderheads. Add to that his ingrained desire to remain unattractive to Spinner's End predators, and he was able to keep all of this … drama from taking over his life. Severus had better things to do with time than trying to impress shallow individuals.

*************************

Lily went to the Slug Club meeting with Helen, but found it incredibly boring.

She didn't care what gifts Slughorn had received. She didn't care much about recent graduates' successes since there weren't many she knew well enough. And Lily didn't want to hear that Slughorn's almost surprise for his group of favorites had been sidetracked by the Headmaster so he could only offer it to Slytherins tomorrow.

Lily didn't know what was going on in the Infirmary tomorrow afternoon, but if it was mandatory, why should some Slytherins get excused to portkey to a quidditch match? She had never even heard of this Bagman fellow, and to hear Potter and his fan club talk, the beater was the lowest position on a team. Besides, quidditch games could last a while, didn't any of them have homework this weekend? There was a Slytherin game so they were mostly tied up for hours today too.

*************************

Something was odd at lunch the next day. Most of Slytherin house was missing. Severus and a handful of smaller students were sitting together at the end closest to the staff table. Lily scanned the head table, and Prof. Slughorn was missing. Why would Dumbledore let Slughorn take so many Slytherins out of school for the afternoon, even if it was a Sunday?

Since 6th and 7th years had their mystery class first, Lily went over and sat down on the bench next to Severus, who was reading with his hair hanging forward to block out the younger students.

The other Slyterin students didn't ignore Lily, glaring at her as her Gryffindor behind sullied their bench. She gave them a withering glance back, and was tempted to put her hands all over their food.

"Why are you here, Sev?"

"Lunch."

Lily looked at his plate. Whatever he had used a fork to eat was gone, there was still some grapes and slices of apple and cheese.

"What about quidditch?"

He shrugged and closed his book. "I have stuff to do today. That thing in the infirmary is only an hour."

"Do you need any help?"

"It's fine, Lily," Severus responded while resuming his lunch.

She frowned looking at the Slytherin table. The entire table was set for the whole house to have lunch, with large platters of untouched food along its length. Although magic was involved somehow, it struck her as extremely wasteful.

"Did everyone go with just Slughorn?"

"No, that new flying teacher went too. Not sure if she even likes the Wasps."

"She seems alright," Lily commented.

"Did you want to head up now?"

"Alright."

Since they were leaving early, Severus and Lily had plenty of time to walk slowly and by a more scenic route. With a quarter of the students missing, and many still at lunch, it was quite nice till they made the final turn that put them back on the primary route to the Infirmary.

Potter, Black, Pettigrew and Lupin had two 6th year Hufflepuff girls backed up against a suit of armor. The girls were looking past the boys hopeful that help would arrive soon.

"So you two could go with us next week to Hogsmeade," Black insisted.

"Well... uh, we already told some ..."

"Pfft. Just tell them you are going with us now," Pettigrew replied confidently.

"You know, I have a Nimbus," Potter was telling them.

Lily rolled her eyes. Not the Nimbus again! When she was a first year, she had gotten around to looking that up because it was something Potter always talked about, his Nimbus that he couldn't bring to school till next year. Not good enough to wait till second year to let them all see this broom. Oh no.

James Potter and his family only purchased a Nimbus, Devlin Whitehorn started that broom company in 1967. Stuck-up snob thinking an expensive broom made him sound all groovy. Probably the only reason he got a place on the house team as a second year, from what she understood from Parkin.

"Leave them alone," Lily snapped. "They said they have plans already."

Black folded his arms over his chest, and replied, "We're offering them better." He purposely looked her and Snape, beside her, over from head to toe in a dismissive manner.

"Evans, you could come with us too," Potter eagerly added while unsmoothing his hair with his hand.

"I also have plans so why don't you lot just move along?"

"Plans?" Potter asked, confused because Evans was just as green as she was three days ago when she got out of St. Mungo's.

"Who cares?" Pettigrew muttered in Evans' direction, before returning his attention to the lovely Hufflepuffs. Suggestively he said, "You girls like Honeyduke's and maybe a butterbeer at the Three Broomsticks?"

"Don't leave out Zonko's, Pettigrew," Lily added sarcastically.

"That pretty much goes without saying, doesn't it?" Black asked.

When Lily burst out in giggles at the pointless day the boys had planned, just like any other time they had been going to Hogsmeade since they were thirteen, Black and Pettigrew took offense.

Potter suggested, "I'd go someplace new with you in Hogsmeade, Evans."

"Maybe the Hog's Head," Sirius suggested. "It's dark in there."

The drawing of wands happened simultaneously, with Lupin being the only one not to take his out. Even the two Hufflepuffs slowly took out theirs, in case they needed to defend themselves from the creators of the Breast Baring Jinx. Where were the rest of the Hufflepuffs to save them from these immature beasts? They already had attacked Evans before, so her being a prefect meant little since they didn't receive any meaningful punishment.

Severus' _Protego_ was a heartbeat sooner, covering both himself and Lily, then Potters' _Impedimenta _and Black's _Levicorpus_. Less than a second later, Evans finished casting _Expelliarmus_ at Potter, then Pettigrew's slow _Stupefy_ was cast, but still blocked by the original shield charm.

Emboldened by the success of Snape and Evans to resist a group attack by the nastiest bullies at the school, the two Hufflepuffs cast _Expelliarmus_ at Black and Pettigrew's backs.

Being disarmed did not deter the Marauders, who were loudly proclaiming that Severus and his newfound Hufflepuff allies were sneaky and attacked innocent people from behind. As more Hufflepuffs arrived with some Ravenclaws, also on their way to the Infirmary for this mandatory class, they found no one to believe their story of outrage. The Hufflepuff tale made them all wary that in the next week, no female would be safe from being pressured by the Marauders to be their dates to the first Hogsmeade weekend of the year. They would not take 'no' as an answer.

Madam Pomfrey came out of the Infirmary as the volume grew, and Prof. McGonagall came from the other direction, walking with Parkin and MacDonald. Pomfrey deferred to McGonagall, and invited all those not directly involved to take a seat inside.

McGonagall quickly reached a decision to give Potter, Black and Pettigrew detention. The opposing side was in agreement that Lupin cast nothing. Her Gryffindors insisting that Snape started it when he cast no spell at them was ludicrous, and she did not blame any of the ladies for disarming those boys once they started casting offensive spells. She would have a good deal of time with them tonight to explain their probation extended to more than undressing fellow students.

She was still steaming at their immaturity the other day when she addressed the assembled 6th and 7th years gathered in the infirmary, seated facing a screen that had been put up for Madam Pomfrey's presentation. "As you may have heard, a baseless rumor was cast about widely on Friday that has caused a great deal of undue confusion, especially among the younger students."

Shifting her narrowed eyes to James Potter, "Preying upon the ignorance of innocent children will not be tolerated at Hogwart's. Especially at the cost of your classmate's reputation, which is so much above the example you set with your own immature, self-serving behavior. Do I make myself clear, Mr. Potter? Oh, and probably you too, Mr. Black and Mr. Pettigrew?"

A chorus of "Huh", "Whatever." and "What?" came from the section up front which Prof. McGonagall had cleared for them.

"That will be another detention, gentlemen. I invite you to keep testing me." Turning aside, she yielded the floor, "Madam Pomfrey, you may begin whenever you are ready."

"Alright then, I'll keep this brief and infomative since I'm sure at your age, you've already heard all about wizards and witches from your parents. If you have any personal questions, you can always stop by and ask me privately."

Lily frowned, wizards and witches? She recognized the illustration that flashed up on the screen from the baby book from St. Mungo's. Oh gosh, and she was sitting next to Severus, with Mary and Helen on the other side of her.

Madam Pomfrey did mention a few things that Lily didn't know, but she maintained an attentive look throughout the presentation. There was a couple things about the boy bits that suddenly made some sense to her once she heard it explained. The anti-pregnancy spell on the castle and grounds seemed to be common knowledge, but they were also taught a contraceptive charm.

What Lily wanted to know was, how was her mother supposed to teach her any charms at all? Either to prevent or aid these kind of things.

Quite a few times, she had glanced at Severus. He would look back at her, but unlike the male Gryffindors in front who found this whole talk hilarious, Severus was behaving himself. Mary and Helen were also calmly paying attention. Lily had looked their way a few times too, to see if they were as embarrassed as her with Severus sitting here.

She also had to keep a confused look off her face when Madam Pomfrey briefly talked about wizard couples and witch couples, but didn't explain how they interacted. If the male part fit into the female part, what did they do, if they did anything at all?

At the end of the presentation, no one asked any questions, so Lily didn't ask any either.

Prof. McGonagall removed all the 6th year Gryffindor boys to her office for some more discussion on how they were to behave properly.

As they were leaving, Helen asked, "What time are they expected back?"

Lily gave Severus a nudge. He muttered, "I suppose whenever the game is over."

"They were supposed to meet us in the library."

He sighed then said, "They are interested in going with you to Hogsmeade next week."

"How interested?"

"I can't speak for them." Severus broke away from the Gryffindor girls, and mentioned, "I have some work to catch up on."

Confused, Lily didn't know if Severus really had something he needed to do, or he just wanted to avoid Mary and Helen asking questions about his friends. "Sev, will we see you in the library later?"

"I suppose, if they get back in time."

"Alright."

Once he turned away on the staircase, Mary commented, "At least he wasn't laughing like a hyena in there. That was so boring."

Helen agreed, "I know. All Potter's fault, ruining everyone's Sunday afternoon."

Lily just followed them back to the tower. She learned things, but would they think her silly if she said that? Although she wouldn't have thought Severus a better choice to talk with about these things, he wouldn't laugh at her, or at least not for long.

************************

Still alive and well, Abraxas Malfoy was puzzled by the information that was forming on Tom Riddle, Slytherin, Hogwart's Class of 1945. His father was also named Tom Riddle and was a muggle? His muggle grandparents were Thomas and Mary Riddle of Little Hangleton, and their home was called the Riddle House? This looked too simple. Although he had been calling himself publicly Lord Voldemort for close to ten years now, that was not long enough for a wizard to forget his original name.

Mother was a witch who didn't attend Hogwart's. A squib most likely. That was marginally better than being a regular half-blood. Half-bloods were the lowest form of partial wizard there was. They were intentionally created by their parents, who should know better. At least muggleborns' parents were totally clueless and were just doing what came naturally to them and screwed like kneazles.

Maybe he'd pay a visit to his friend, Crouch, down at the Ministry. If any of this were true, pureblood support for this substandard wizard, who dared to think himself above a Malfoy, would soon dry up.

************************

At dinner, they saw the Slytherins had returned so the girls kept to their plan to meet with the boys this evening. They intended to agree to go as a group of six to Hogsmeade, and for Lily sit with them in the library this week.

They did not have any homework left to work on, so they spent their time discussing Hogsmeade next week. Helen and Mary were inclined to let Malcolm and Evan plan the day to see what they had in mind to impress them. Lily agreed that if it was a circuit of Zonko's, Honeyduke's and then a butterbeer at the Three Broomsticks, then they weren't the caliber of fellow they were looking for. Although Severus could influence them away from those spots, if he tried. Lily already knew his opinion of the typical afternoon in Hogsmeade. Maybe she should tell him not to, since Mary and Helen were using it as a test to gauge whether they suited. Lily would go with Severus to Hogsmeade other times after this.

Since they still had plenty of time before curfew, they decided to leave the library together, but in pairs. Helen and Evan, along with Mary and Malcolm were interested in having some quality couple time. Severus and Lily were free to do as they liked, rather than being forced together. Obviously neither of their roommates realized that their friendship did involve time with each other, and it was not only due to Severus' normally abrasive personality keeping others at a distance.

Severus suggested quietly, "Maybe we should tag along with them. If there's trouble, they'll be six of us."

With so many of the students becoming openly aggressive towards her, Lily considered Severus' overcautious attitude. Also, if either of the boys got fresh, Lily would be a shout away, rather than staying up late this evening wondering where either of them were.

Rosier and Wilkes already had someplace in mind two floors up on the sixth floor. Lily knew this floor attracted snoggers and troublemakers looking for silly duels. None of the other four said anything as Lily and Severus followed along with each turn and then finally ducked under a tapestry. They also cast _Lumos_ and found it covered a door to a storage room that was partially filled long ago. It was large enough that they were able to get enough distance between each couple. Wilkes warded the door to warn them if anyone opened it. There were plenty of comfy spots that there was no need to argue, and they quietly remained in their pairs.

Severus chose a large, old chair in the corner, cast _muffliato_ and then did something to his _lumos_ to free it from his wand tip, and it split into a number of fairy lights on the ceiling. When Lily cast _nox_, she intially felt it was a little too dark.

He sat down to one side and reached for Lily's hand, while asking, "So how was your day?"

Lily laughed, and wedged herself in next to Severus. "What did you think of our mandatory class?"

Severus sighed and said, "Madam Pomfrey did what she was supposed to do. The facts, but nothing extra to make anyone who didn't know, think they should immediately run out of there and go shag."

"So you know everything, Sev?"

"What makes you ask that, Lily?"

"You knew things were missing."

"You know that too." He then added, "Don't you? There was nothing at all about kissing and touching."

"It's not necessary."

Severus snorted, then said, "That sounds very male."

"Why?"

Sighing, he explained, "Many just want to get to the part Pomfrey covered, and not worry about whether the witch likes it or not."

"If she loves him, won't she?"

"Perhaps, but there's more that a wizard could do."

"Would you?"

"Why wouldn't I try to make you happy, Lily?"

"Well, yeah … but … like what else?"

"Wouldn't you rather find out together? If we find something we like, maybe it'll be brilliant. Something we don't, then we'll know."

"How about now, Sev?" Lily asked, placing her hand on the front of his trousers.

Severus took her hand by the wrist, and reminded her, "I still can't have any of my skin rubbed for now. Besides, I like the slow pace we've set, rather than just ignoring the things we've enjoyed so far by slowly exploring and savoring it."

Lily didn't protest as Severus leaned his face close to hers for a kiss. Slow exploration sounded perfect to her as she opened her mouth to let him know she wanted in. Besides, with others in the room, even if they couldn't be seen, now was not the time to start baring herself to try something new.

Side by side was not as nice as being on top, so Lily withdrew her tongue from Severus' mouth and then twisted herself to climb onto his lap like last time. She had to nudge him into the center of the seat, so there was enough room on either side of him for her knees to rest comfortably.

"Did you learn anything new today?"

She felt him hesitate under her and hold his breath for a moment, before he muttered, "Not necessarily. I hadn't considered that my mother could have more children."

Lily frowned in thought. Severus said his parents still … did it, but how? Did his mother ever move from the kitchen, or did they do it there? These thoughts got Lily out of the snogging mood. "What if she did?"

"I don't know. She may be able to take care of it, like she did me. I'm not sure."

Although Lily's impression was that Severus' parents did not take care of him, she understood that prior to him jumping out from behind a bush at the playground, surprising Petunia and her about eight years ago, that he needed more care like diapers and feeding. At least for the first year, or maybe longer? The length of time between infant and semi-independent toddler was rather vague in her head. When did Severus need to start dressing and feeding himself? Was it easier to learn how to go to the bathroom in the garden, or indoor plumbing? Would he expect his children to be as motivated as him, and need little supervision? Although he did not attend regular school, Severus knew things. Lily thought he said his mother taught him to read and some spells. Reading well had taken Lily years, along with learning how to print and write cursive. Her friend was smart, but even if he could learn in half the time it took Lily, it would have meant his mother actually did something beyond caring for him till he was potty trained, and then stuck him on the Hogwart's Express at the age of eleven.

"What would happen if she couldn't?" Lily asked.

"Even if she could …" Severus started. "Either I'd have to, or it'd just be better to prevent it suffering by dumping it in the river."

Lily felt a feeling of dread wash over her. She didn't know what argument to use to say that hypothetical solution was wrong. It was wrong, she knew that. If Severus had a choice, to have been killed as a newborn rather than live the life he had lived till now, would that have been what he would want? She heard people here at Hogwart's come right out and say they attacked him merely because he existed. The staff certainly didn't show concern. Lily realized that Severus didn't exaggerate much when it came to the school caring about his safety. Why should they, would his parents complain if he never came back on the train in June? Probably think he had gotten smart enough to not return to Spinner's End. At least at home, even when Petunia was being her most unpleasant, she never said she wanted Severus dead, just for him to stay where he belonged.

Rather than trying to get specifics out of Severus, Lily led him with an open question, "Why would you say that?"

"It's hard to put into words, Lily. Even simple things like food are difficult. My mother called every piece of meat 'chicken'. I'm not certain I ever had real chicken before I came to Hogwart's. I tasted it here just to see."

"But here you know what things are."

"Where does it come from? Food cannot be created by transfiguration. How do I know the animal was in good health, rather than parasite-ridden, diseased, covered in oozing sores, and able to walk to its own slaughter? It may have lived in a dark shed, knee-deep in its own waste for its entire life with its legs slowly rotting away. Additionally, how do the house elves know the suppliers aren't lying? Everyone lies when there's money to be made."

"No, they don't, Sev. They know we're children and wouldn't sell something to the school that we shouldn't eat. I've seen chickens, sheep and cows on television. Pigs kind of wallow around in the farmyard mud, but that's the way they are. You are overthinking due to some of the questionable sources … the food in your youth came from."

"When the owl that brought my school letter ended up getting boiled for dinner, I knew nothing was safe from getting thrown into the pot."

Lily opened her mouth to tell Severus that couldn't be true, but then closed it. Maybe it was true. Something had happened to make him treat food with mistrust. Owl was close enough to chicken that it might not be bad … if Lily didn't like her own pet owl. Even when she was younger, Severus' mother couldn't have had enough correspondents to risk nabbing one of those owls. What else was served as chicken at the Snapes? There were a lot of rats by the river, but his mother wouldn't cook that, would she? Maybe. If she was drinking heavily then, maybe it didn't matter to her. It didn't seem to have done Severus any harm, but maybe it was the deception of calling everything chicken that hurt him most.

"Being a vegetarian due to concern for the welfare of animals is alright, Sev, but you should make an effort to eat more of other things."

Did Lily ever listen to him? Severus wondered. He was concerned about himself, not the animals. It was more than mystery meat, there was improperly stored food that could be infested, or include tainted ingredients. It wasn't worth talking about it, if Lily could not be bothered to make an effort to understand his point of view. Rather than saying more, Severus put his arms around Lily and rested his head against her shoulder.

Lily responded by putting her arms around Severus. Although he was getting older, her friend needed someone to care about him.

Her quiet thoughts were interrupted by sounds from within the darkened room. Only her and Severus had any light, so her imagination was free to supply activities to match the loud sighs, male and female moans, and something sort of audibly wet.

She whispered, "What do you think they're doing, Sev?"

Feeling more than hearing his snort of warm breath against her neck as Severus tilted his head, Lily heard Severus whisper a reply, "Getting better acquainted?"

"Huh? Are you trying to be funny?"

"No. Unlike us, they don't know each other, and don't want to waste time to later find out they aren't compatible."

"Why wouldn't they be compatible?"

"It's an excuse to snog and get their hands on each other. They don't bother getting clever with toothbrushes."

Lily tutted in response, then said, "It sounds like more than kissing."

"Perhaps, or it could just be loud kissing. We're rather quiet, compared to others."

"What do you mean? Why would kissing be loud?"

Severus took a turn making a tutting noise, then explained, "When they get aggressive and hurried, and they also make noise to spur the other on."

"Do you want me to make noise?"

"I think you're perfect, Lily. Though if you feel the urge, you may, but it's not necessary."

"If I feel the urge?" she sarcastically asked, and leaned back breaking their embrace.

"Hmmm mmm."

"Maybe we should go, Sev. They are being a bad influence on you."

"As you wish, Lily."

"I do."

"Are you going to get off me?"

"Can't you carry me?"

"Maybe," Severus replied, but as soon as he moved his hands under her bottom to get a logical enough hold to avoid dropping her, Lily scrambled off his lap

She said, "Just kidding, Sev. You'll get hurt. There's too many obstacles in here anyway. Probably land on top of me."

"If I recall correctly, you usually land on me." He removed the alarm from the door, opened it, reversed the _muffliato,_ then added in a louder voice, "We're going."

Barely audible murmurs replied. Lily was eager to ask Helen and Mary what they were doing. Did this mean they were serious about these two? Now that she had put her tongue in her best friend's mouth, that meant a bit more than just kissing her best friend frequently. Maybe her roommates' definition of what their status was would help explain how she felt about Severus.

************************

Lily was still confused later in the week as she went down to Potions with Severus. Now that they knew post-library time with the others had turned into snogging sessions, neither of them wanted to tag along.

Lily heard quite enough Sunday about her and Severus talking the whole time. Mary and Helen were in favor of Lily only talking with Severus, but they could talk anywhere and anytime. Lily could tell them they did more than that, but bragging didn't seem right. Until they gave details about what they've been doing with boys, it would be uncomfortable for Lily to talk about it. She also wasn't sure she wanted to think of Severus as more than her best friend.

Her friend still seemed determined to stay on a course to marry her. Lily wouldn't say they were 'compatible', but she really couldn't envision someone else putting up with Severus. Not that he ever tried to broaden his circle of friends beyond her, and this new group of younger Slytherins, who were following him to meals, and whatever they got up to down in their house's dungeons.

At the moment, Lily had no other prospects, but she was young and only green and scarred with pockmarks temporarily. Maybe in 7th year, she'd catch someone's notice. If not,there was always once she graduated Hogwart's to meet mature wizards that thought about things other than quidditch and practical jokes. Though maybe not, Prof. Dumbledore cared more about candy than what went on at the school, and Prof. Slughorn only cared about himself.

A whole week had passed so it was another lab. After dinner, Severus and her were supposed to report to the Infirmary for a check-up.

Everything started out fine for the lab, even though her friend was still seated next to Potter and in front of Black. It contradicted Slughorn's inherent laziness to invite that kind of trouble.

Approximately fifteen minutes into class, Sirius Black realized he had messed up his potion. Must have not gotten enough sleep after their night out with Moony. There would be time to start again, but then he'd have to hurry and pay strict attention to what he was doing. Boring. James' potion must be going alright since he was ignoring all his psting. When Snape turned around to give him a dark glare, Sirius showed the creep his two middle fingers. Snivellus couldn't keep his large, greasy nose out of things that didn't concern him. Since when did Sirius want his attention? Like never. Greasy nosy parker. Hey, now that Snivelly wanted to play, how about he help him out with giving him a reason to shampoo that oil slick that was dripping out of his scalp? Here he had a perfectly disgusting, ruined potion, and with a hover charm, he'd have something to brighten things up in this dreary dungeon.

Lily saw it first. She had been glancing at the front corner of the classroom frequently. A cauldron hovering in midair was not good. Rather than getting out the warning the meant to say, all that got out was a gasping sound. When some members of the class looked at her, she pointed to get their attention on what was important and tried to get her wand out.

It was the mutter of 'fucking gryffindors' from over his left shoulder that got James' attention. With trepidation, he looked to his right to see Sirius grinning, looking upward while holding his wand. James saw the cauldron, and Snape was on the step where an ingredient was precisely added after each stir so his focus was totally on his own cauldron. He was hunched forward protectively to keep smaller stray objects from being thrown into it.

The decision was split-second. James did not want Evans cooing over Snivellus while he exaggerated how hurt and sick he was. If he broke Sirius' concentration, the cauldron would come down anyway so he shoved Snape. Of course, he was such a pathetic lightweight that the shove moved him, splattering his cauldron's contents onto one of James' hands. Luckily, Sirius' cauldron had dropped onto their table, rather than on Snape's head. That's the thanks he gets for trying to help. His hand really hurt – that was hot!

Many in the class were frozen watching as yet another bullying at the hands of Potter and Black unfolded right here in Potions, while the teacher was still in the room. The Hufflepuff sharing a table with Black tried to push past him to extinguish Snape's robe sleeve that had passed through the flame under his cauldron, but Black chose to push back and get into a physical altercation. No one pushed him around!

Being set on fire, while low on his list of possible ways of getting injured, had occurred to Severus so he already planned out what he should do in this circumstance. Although still gasping from getting two cauldrons of hot liquid splashed onto him, while still trying to get his breath back from being shoved to the stone floor, fire was still fire, and commanded his attention. Later, Severus knew he'd replay this scene over and over in his head on how he could have made this look graceful. For now though, he just settled for rolling over onto his arm to snuff out the flame before it spread. Lily was across the room, so if he didn't help himself, no one would. Probably clap and cheer while the flame merrily burned him. How he hated it here!

When Slughorn, ignorant and interrupted from his correspondence, yelled from his desk, "Snape! You clumsy twit, you spilled Black's potion! Detention with Filch tonight at eight." Lowering his voice, he continued, "No need to be upset, Black. You'll receive full marks."

Already finished with putting the pushy Hufflepuff in his place, Sirius replied, "Thank you, professor."

Cries of outrage and protest rang out in the dungeon. James raised his hand, "Professor, may I please go to the Infirmary? My hand was burnt."

"Please do, Mr. Potter. Another detention tomorrow, Snape. For not following safety procedures."

With so many missing the timing on their potions, students cast _evanesco_, while continuing to complain while Potter speedily cleaned up his area and strutted out the door.

"Get off the floor, and get that mess cleaned up, Snape."

Loudly, Wilkes called, "Prof. Slughorn! There are five prefects in this class. Who are you going to believe when all of us say that Black and Potter attacked Snape?"

"Nonsense!" yelled a smirking Black in reply. "And no one asked you, Wilkes."

For the Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws in the class, who had not previously had Potions with Gryffindor and Slytherin, this blatant disregard for safety by playing dangerous jokes in class was not lost. Any that still had a potion simmering cast _evanesco_ in protest.

Lily was about to go to Severus when she saw his head, then the rest of him, as he rose to get to the task of cleaning. Smelling her potion burning, Lily was the last person to cast _evanesco._ She continued watching Severus as he cleaned up, and dried and repaired his uniform. He finished by sneering at Black, while returning his cauldron by clunking it down on Black's table.

Slughorn looked up and realized no one in class had a potion simmering. "You may go. We'll attempt brewing this again next class."

For a man his size, Slughorn could sure disappear fast. He had more practice so he was out of the classroom, while Sirius was just putting his bag over his shoulder, while thinking about skiving Magical Creatures. Remus wouldn't be there, and James wouldn't head there straight from the Infirmary.

"Ten points for not following safety rules," Lily snapped as she marched up the aisle to join Severus and check on how he was, before she headed to class.

"Hey! If something happened then, it would be up to the teacher to take points."

"Ten points from Gryffindor for fighting, Black," one of the Hufflepuffs added.

"Five points for an untucked shirt, Black," Wilkes said.

"Those shoes could use a shine, Black. Five points," uttered a narrow-eyed Ravenclaw prefect.

The second Ravenclaw prefect studied Black. She could jinx Black to get a bigger deduction, but jinxing was the Marauder way. She settled for, "Tie's crooked. Five points, Black."

"Have you all gone crazy?" Black asked.

"Do you need a hanky?" Wilkes inquired sardonically.

"Maybe your mommy will get those points back for you, Black."

"What do you mean?" inquired Black, getting worried because some sort of madness was spreading through the class.

"Your family got a photo of Dumbledore blowing bubble gum while screwing a sheep?"

"Naw, his mum gives He Who Must Not Be Named a good broom polishing."

Sirius laughed as he left. Insulting his mother? How juvenile. He couldn't give a flying crap what they said about her. It would be sweet though. His father could have caught some wand-wilting disease from a French whore, given it to his mother, and she could give it to Moldyspore.

Seething in annoyance, Sirius waited for Peter in the Front Hall so they could go to class together. Points meant nothing to him since Gryffindor's quidditch team was rubbish with Parkin as captain. They had no chance at the House Cup. What irritated him was all these morons acting like Snivellus wasn't here solely for their amusement. Snape was such a Merlin-cursed loser. Who cared if a cauldron got dropped on his greasy head, or he slipped in his own oil spill and fell to the floor?

***********************************

Rather than answering her question, Severus told Lily, "You'll be late to class, if you don't go now."

"But what about you? I can walk you up to the Infirmary, Sev."

"I have class," Severus muttered as he headed to the door.

Lily followed, "Aren't you hurt?"

"It doesn't matter."

"Yes, it does."

"Not at Hogwart's."

"Go to the Infirmary."

"Can't. If Pomfrey doesn't think I'm injured enough, I won't get a pass to go back to class. That'll be points and maybe another detention."

"At lunch then?"

Wilkes butted in, "I'll walk you up after class, Snape."

"We're going upstairs, Lily."

"Oh, yeah," Lily murmured. She had class with her fellow Gryffindor toerags. Lily passed by Sirius Black in the Front Hall before she went outside.

***********************************

Severus felt his arm was fine. With the loose sleeve of the robe, over his sweater, and then his long-sleeve shirt, he didn't feel anything from the brief time the robe was aflame. It was where the hot liquid spilled on him that hurt. Burns were always painful. He couldn't tell how hurt he was until he got a chance to look at it. If he could even tell, with all the green. New blisters would be a sign that he was injured, rather than just painful irritation.

He could tolerate a class. If Pomfrey couldn't be bothered, he could look himself over at lunch.

Not sure who he was seeing about his dragonpox tonight. Pye and Spleen said they'd be checking weekly, but that could just be written reports from Pomfrey. She did not have to see him to write down whatever would keep people out of her infirmary, especially him.

***********************************

Regulus Black and his buddy, Barty, were on their way back from Magical Creatures in a crowd of fourth years, when Regulus saw Evans in all her horrific greenness heading down the hill towards them. His impatience to debut his Bottom Baring Jinx might need a new victim to premiere it on. Evans had been lucky for days since he chose her, with not a Marauder in close proximity whenever they passed.

Ah, there was his brother's fat head, with Pettigrew waddling beside him. Where's the other two idiotic thugs? They weren't letting the loss of Potter and Lupin slow them down though, they both had their wands out ready to jinx the fourth years as they passed. Morons didn't realize that they started leaving class in a group weeks ago so they couldn't pick off the stragglers. The Hufflepuffs were so easy to manipulate.

Speaking of easy to manipulate, if Regulus could slow Evans and speed up his dimwitted brother, his wait could be over. To get his brother's instant attention, Regulus stepped out of the tight pack of fourth years. Sirius would not be able to resist. Gritting his teeth to do the unthinkable and address a mudblood civilly, Regulus called out, "Alright, Evans?" She was Snape's friend so perhaps the Slytherins with him could forgive him, if what was about to happen did not wipe it from their memories.

One of the Hufflepuff girls behind him in his group muttered, "Why is she walking alone? They are going to get her."

Although lost in her own thoughts about what happened in Potions, Lily did remember Regulus Black. He was nothing like his brother. Pity he wasn't the one sorted into Gryffindor. She paused, waved and yelled, "Hi!"

Regulus smiled and while pretending he was waving back with his left hand, slid his wand tip down his sleeve to let it extend just past his fingertips. He was ready, when Sirius bellowed "Oy there!"

Verbally, Regulus replied loudly, "What's it to you?", but nonverbally was something quite different as he raised his hands to gesture at his brother, behind Evans.

Evans' robe forcefully whipped up and tangled around her head, and her skirt ascended straight up. Regulus was highly disappointed. The pink knickers she was wearing over her viridity were covering everything and more, without even a scrap of lace to make them look a bit feminine. Did her mother pick those out? They looked like something his mother would approve of, until people became sensible and went back to wearing bloomers. What a waste of a spell. All this anticipation and it was ruined by Evans. Freaking mudblood.

Surprised, Lily screamed. Her arms were trapped, and she couldn't see. She fell over as she tried to free her arms on the uneven hill that she had been descending. Oh no, she could feel the grass on her thighs. Had her skirt shifted up as she fell?

Pettigrew was the first to laugh when he saw Evans' pink knickered bum. About time someone put that swot into her place. If it wasn't for James, he gladly would have done it. She had been asking for it. Taking points from them and carrying on like she was their mothers. They were at school to get away from their mothers, not find a new one.

"What the...?" asked Sirius, raising his wand to retaliate against whoever cast that spell on Evans. That was uncalled for.

Sirius did not have time to pick a target because he was tackled from behind by the equally muscled and bulked Evan Rosier. Rosier then concentrated on abusing Black's wand hand before he cast something else by grabbing it in both hands and bending his fingers painfully back, while Black screamed.

Peter might have been able to act, but Avery punching him in the face prevented that. Avery was not protecting Evans, a mudblood, at all. He just felt like this was a convenient time to punch that loudmouth Pettigrew. Without his mates to stick up for him, he would have to defend his browned nose by his lonesome.

The fourth years surged past Regulus to help Evans. Well, the Hufflepuffs did. Weighing the advantages of different courses of action, Regulus looked at the older Slytherins pummeling Black and Pettigrew. House unity decided it. Stepping forward, Regulus cast a spell that seemed to be one of Snape's favorites when they were testing his patience, "_Finite incantatem." _He let the Hufflepuffs sort Evans, while he enjoyed the show his brother was giving.

***********************************

Lily did not see Severus again till Charms. Classes were sure to be unpleasant this afternoon. With Potter, Black and Pettigrew all paying a visit to the Infirmary today, they were sure to be itching for revenge, even though it was really Black that led to Potter's injury, and the stupidity of the other two that led to theirs. Even though they denied it, one of them exposed her underwear. Again.

They were not in class yet when Lily arrived, and headed to Severus' back corner to wait. He arrived with Wilkes. Wilkes was surly looking and talking in low voice to Severus, who he had by the arm and continued to their back corner to take a seat there himself.

" … Headmaster tonight, if it's not sorted," Wilkes said as he sat. "Evans, if I need to get all five prefects from Potions together, are you available?"

"Sure. What's up?"

"Pomfrey is being a git. Pain builds character, my arse."

"She didn't?"

"She did," muttered Severus. "Maybe she'll take care of it later. She's angry that Potter got hurt."

Lily was still rolling her eyes at the golden boy's boo boo, when Potter, Black and Pettigrew sauntered into class. Pomfrey had no problem sorting out her favorites. None of them looked like a hair was out of place, even on Potter's purposely messy head.

Once class started, she asked, "Are you alright for the afternoon? How bad is the burn?"

Severus shrugged. He had little choice whether he was alright or not.

Malcolm muttered, "Madam Pompfrey corrected us. Snape was scalded because it was a liquid. He's got patches of darker green skin, some blisters."

"So she saw?"

"No, I looked when she wouldn't. If Snape wasn't so stubborn, I'd have dragged him to Dumbledore."

"He doesn't give a shit."

"Prof. Dumbledore visited us in St. Mungo's," Lily recalled.

"Must have missed it."

"It was when you were kept knocked out to keep that breathing tube in you."

"Hmm. I think in that case he was visiting you."

Wilkes suggested, "Maybe he stopped by to or from the Ministry. He's down in London a lot, rather than hanging around the school."

"As long as he's back in time for dessert, that's the important thing," Severus sneered.

Although she knew her friend was bitter, the Headmaster's life and conversation seemed to revolve around the next sweet to come his way. Lily had heard Dumbledore was a Gryffindor. Do they really stay so immature even when they reach that age? Was he still pulling pranks? At what age did he stop playing quidditch, or was he still zooming around the pitch on a broom? What did he think of the relatively new Nimbus brand? Why was Lily sorted into the shallow house of losers? Also, why had McGonagall ended up there too? She seemed like a good sort. Was it just the males?

Defense was more of the same, except they talked less. Lily was angry at so much. So many around her were acting like it was a typical day. Was it to them? As long as they didn't have heavy metal objects dropped on them, weren't set on fire, and didn't have their undies shown off in public, everything was just absolutely spiffing? Cowardly toerags.

This instructor was taking the threat of He Who Must Not Be Named and Death Eater followers seriously. He was actually attempting to teach them practical defense against giants, werewolves, vampires, inferi, dementors and the current trends in Dark Arts this year.

Unfortunately, he was not a forceful and loud individual so private conversations sometimes drowned out what he was saying. Like what Peter Pettigrew would be buying at Honeyduke's on Saturday. Lily was so glad that his life could carry on with no interruption, and he'd be able to drag his own weight in confections back up to the castle, to stick to every surface in the Gryffindor common room. Maybe that would be a better defense against inferi. Using half sucked lollipops as a sort of flypaper trap.

Not being able to bear it any longer, Lily loudly hissed, "Shut … up!"

Pettigrew turned to look back, and then had the audacity to lightly put his hand up to his chest questioningly.

"Yes, I'm talking to you, toerag."

Black laughed, "Aw, come on. Inferi? They're just a story to scare little kids and muggleborns."

"No, they're not," Severus replied.

Potter chortled before he even got his witty repartee out. "You're forgetting Snape's parents, Padfoot."

Pettigrew found that hilarious, and overreacted by slapping his hand to the table top in front of him repeatedly.

"Did you have a question, Mr. Pettigrew?"

All eyes turned to Pettigrew, who wiped an invisible tear from his face before giggling out, "Can inferi have sex?"

"That is not relevant, Pettigrew. Ten points. Five for interrupting my class, and another five for impertinence. This is an important topic. For inferi, they cannot feel pain and are resistant to many spells. Flames, even something as simple as _Incendio_..."

Very funny, Lily thought. Is that why it was alright to set her friend on fire? Severus didn't seem to react to it being more unusual than anything else that happened to him around this heap of stone. When were they going to do that to her too? Would she have the presence of mind to react to a possibly life-threatening situation? Unlike her best friend, she did not spend all her free time scheming to protect herself from perceived dangers. Severus had too much practice at being injured to think that he could simply float through life like her. She should have her wand ready, and maybe like Severus did yesterday, cast a shield spell when unsure what was going to be used against her. It would be less embarrassing than having her skirt lifted while she screamed foolishly. They wouldn't stop at just seeing underwear. They would remove every stitch from a person. Maybe that was their next surprise for her, once there was snow on the ground. That would just be lovely.

***********************************

Lily was trying to hurry through dinner, when a little Ravenclaw scuttled over and whispered, "Evans, Head Boy's calling a meeting for after. Wants you there. Classroom eleven."

She looked over because this little firstie was staying so low and out of sight, but she received a nod when she caught the eye of the Head Boy. Looking around, she saw a little Slytherin working her way down the Hufflepuff table.

As she saw the prefects from other tables excuse themselves, Lily looked at Severus. She'd prefer to go with him up to the Infirmary, but he nodded to her and waved. He seemed content to stay among the crowd of younger Slytherins for the time being. She knew that was an act for her benefit, but at least she knew Regulus Black was nothing like his detestable brother. Severus returned to a conversation he was having with him and his blonde friend.

Wilkes changed course slightly to meet her at the door leading out. He tried to reassure her, "Don't worry about him. I don't think he feels pain the same way as us mere mortals do any more."

"Who?" asked one of the female Slytherin prefects.

"Snape."

"Oh, him? He's bloody mad. Remember when Mulciber stabbed him with that knife? Snape just pulled it out, laughed, stabbed Mulciber back with it, and then laughed louder as he twisted it to be heard over Mulciber's screams."

"Yeah, that pretty much ended their feud till this year," someone behind them said.

"I think it's still ended," Wilkes commented. "Mulciber, even with Avery's help, would have to kill him to even start feeling a degree of safety. Why would either of them even dare to invite that kind of trouble?"

"Start feeling?" Lily asked.

"Might come back to haunt them. Not all ghosts are bound to a location," Wilkes said with a wink.

"Snape would be worse than that bother on the second floor. Moaning Myrtle's a drag, but she wasn't a Slytherin," laughed the first girl.

Lily didn't care for this conversation about Severus dying and returning as a vengeful, moody ghost. Bad enough he scared them by stabbing that nasty Mulciber back. He had never mentioned that to her. Obviously it happened before this year, which means she was probably ignoring him while she hung around her girlfriends … while someone was stabbing her best friend. They were probably exaggerating. She had probably seen the mark from it on one of his hands or arms. Severus' skin had a number of blemishes from old injuries.

When she entered classroom eleven with the Slytherins, the Head Boy was already there with the Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff prefects. The Head Girl arrived with the other Slytherins, and she closed the door. Lily was the only Gryffindor present.

The Head Girl joined the Ravenclaw in the front. She said, "It's alright, Evans. Wilkes vouched for you. Besides, we already know you are a target."

"Seemed a bit unfair not to consult at least one Gryffindor," added the Head Boy. "You seem the most level-headed."

"Uh, thanks," Lily replied. She didn't know if she should be flattered, or worried about being 'a target'.

"Alright, I've done some calculations," the Head Boy said as he unfolded a piece of parchment. "Every cast of the Breast-Baring jinx lost Gryffindor 1.7 points each time it was cast last year, once they were finally caught. Today, either Black or Pettigrew cast their new one, and Gryffindor lost no points because they were already at zero."

Lily's anger flared. Well, of course, thanks to the Marauders, her house really had nothing to lose anymore.

There was an outraged cry, "They didn't even lose two points for casting it on me back in May?"

A Hufflepuff threw her hands in the air, "That's because they don't seem to care about winning the House Cup. Why bother with points when they are meaningless as punishment?"

"Well, they aren't going to see my knickers without me plucking out their eyes," swore the Head Girl. "I may not have completely respected Oakby, but they were totally out of line attacking her last year."

Everyone agreed. What good was it to be put in a position of authority when disrespectful snots didn't get punished? They worked hard to get here, their houses and parents should be proud of them, and then this lot strutted around the school like they owned it, while the staff did nothing about it.

"So here's the deal that they cut today - Potter, Black, Pettigrew and Lupin will serve detention every night for a minimum of two hours until Gryffindor house maintains at least a twenty point minimum for one week, and negative point totals will now be subtracted once someone gains them."

"Alright, McGonagall!" cheered someone.

"I don't know,"said one of the Ravenclaws, "they could get a hundred points out of a quidditch match."

"They could, but can they keep them for a week?"

"I won't penalize someone without cause."

"Me neither."

"Hold it. Hold it. We're not asking for you to make up penalties, just to be observant. If you feel you are in danger of retaliation from Gryffindors, wait for another prefect or a staff member. We're going to back each other on this," the Head Girl assured them.

The Head Boy nodded. The Marauders had been trouble since even before he was made Prefect. His bum and other vital bits ached for days after that wedgie. He added, "And Potions, and any other class with Gryffindors, where they are creating an unsafe environment, bring it immediately to the teacher's attention. Don't wait until someone is injured. Prof. Flitwick backs us on that when he heard of what happened in Potions this morning. You five prefects that were there have a meeting with Prof. McGonagall and Prof. Flitwick in her office at eight."

"Yeah, luckily Dumbledore's away again. Probably give them sweets and pat their bottoms for a job well done because no one got killed."

"Their families have probably had to empty their vaults donating to the school to keep those jokers enrolled."

Lily sat there flabbergasted. Someone was finally going to join her and Severus in their … well, not a crusade, but more of a bringing some common sense into the school? The problem had gone on for so long that now younger Gryffindors had adopted their behavior so her entire house was labeled as bad news. If what's his face launched their tower at the moon tonight while they slept, the rest of the school would throw him a party, until they found out the four troublemakers were out of bounds getting a late night snack, and were miraculously still alive and well and blowing up the toilets.

"I heard they attacked muggles over the summer, and bribed their way out of it with Magical Law Enforcement."

"Oh no. We still have to put up with this outside Hogwart's?"

"Can we convince them to move to Australia?"

"If they won't, I will."

"Shit. I'd even move to the Colonies and live with barbarian wizards first."

"Don't have to go that far. Ireland's still got a few wild warlocks running about. They paint themselves blue."

"Britain still has colonies?"

"Maybe, is India still one?"

Lily was shocked how ill informed her fellow students were about modern Great Britain. These prefects were supposed to be the brightest students of each year.

The Head Boy called them back to order. "Alright. You are to pay attention, get help when warranted, and keep those four busy every night till they graduate. Sorry Evans, but it's a lot less trouble to everyone else if they are kept occupied for at least fourteen hours a week."

"They sealed our common room door two weeks ago," complained a Hufflepuff. "They didn't lose a single point, and we lost points for everyone locked out after curfew."

Lily couldn't smooth that over. Hufflepuffs simply had the misfortune of being on the way to the kitchen. There was probably no better reason to target them. Sighing, Lily replied, "Well, I'm willing to give it a try. I agree it's gotten out of control. If it gets too out of hand the other way, I'll come talk to you both."

"Sounds fair enough."

"You do realize that your house does not have a chance at the cup with them, Evans? They haven't won it since they got here, even before prefects realized they were constant trouble."

"I know," she said sadly. She used to naively think getting points in class was worth something, but her housemates would mock her and then lose them in some frivolous manner. The only way Gryffindor had a chance at the cup would be if they could blackmail a staff member. One year, maybe back in third, she dreamed that Gryffindor was awarded hundreds of points at the Leaving Feast and won the cup.

Lily departed with mixed feelings. Her fellow prefects accepted her as level-headed, but it felt like she should be defending her house. Other than a concerted effort to keep those boys in detention, it appeared they were just doing their prefect duties. Lily couldn't think of four more deserving students to be in detention. Severus ended up with two nights of it thanks to Black.

Or, more correctly, Sirius Black. Severus was still sitting at the Slytherin table with Regulus and his friend. If Lily didn't know better, she would have thought her arrival chased them away from the way those two looked at her, then immediately got up. Maybe it was Severus telling them earlier that he was only waiting for her to come back.

"Ready, Sev?"

"I guess," he replied, getting up.

On the way upstairs, once there was no one around them, Severus asked, "Did something happen to you earlier today?"

"What do you mean?"

"I'm not sure," he answered. He lowered his voice and explained, "They tried to suggest that maybe I should make you a gift of some new underwear, but I don't know if they were hinting that would be appropriate or not, or if you just needed some."

"There's nothing wrong with my knickers, Sev. It's just that Pettigrew, or I think it was him, I could hear him laughing like crazy. Anyway, he cast something at me and my robe and skirt lifted in front of the whole fourth year Magical Creatures class."

"What did Kettleburn do?"

"Nothing, it was on the way down, while they were passing me. Rosier and Avery beat him and Sirius Black up. Regulus Black negated it and a couple Hufflepuffs helped me up off the ground. Of course, Black and Pettigrew missed class, and Potter skipped due to his injury from earlier, and then Lupin's out for another couple days. Grandmother's sick."

"He has more grandmothers?"

"That's what I had asked him back in second year, Sev, when he was going to the third funeral for his grandmother. He said there must have been some mistake in what I was told. Besides, I don't know why he misses so much class when one of his relatives gets sick."

"I think it's covering up something else."

"After six years of lame excuses, I think you may be right. Maybe we can question him in Herbology when he gets back."

"Would you like me to hold him down, while you beat the truth out of him, Lily?"

"If he's the one coming up with all these stupid undressing jinxes, then all I can say is 'right on'. Do you know Gryffindor is back down to zero points?"

"Why do you even bother checking that hourglass? Even if you all drank Wit Sharpening potion for a week, that gang of dolts would just do something even more outrageous to get them all taken away."

"Ah, I see someone has been here before us. I'm seeing a trail of lemon sherbets."

"Yeah. That's the kind of crap that gets punished around here. Hogwart's Most Wanted must have come this way."

They entered the Infirmary, and found a sour-faced Madam Pomfrey in her office waiting with Healer Spleen. Even though it was Spleen, Lily was sure he'd at least look at Severus' scalds before judging him undeserving of care.

"So who's going to be first?" he asked with a smile.

"Severus was hurt this morning. Maybe you should look at that first," Lily suggested while studying Pomfrey for any reaction.

"Still talking for your friend, Evans?"

"He gave up because no one ever believes him," she replied sarcastically.

"We were given permission to use this bed over here," Spleen indicated. "So what have you saved for me?"

"Splashed with hot potion," muttered Severus.

"And set on fire," Lily added.

"That's fine. The robe was loose enough that my arm was untouched."

"So where's these scalds, Severus?"

"My torso."

"Alright then, off with everything from the waist up," Spleen said as he closed the curtain.

Severus looked at Lily who was taking the seat next to the bed. "What?" she asked. "It's not your trousers, Sev."

As her friend shrugged out of his robe and was pulling his school sweater over his head, Lily added, "And I heard that you got stabbed. Can you point out where that was?"

"That?" Severus asked, while unbuttoning his shirt. "That was like three years ago."

"Has there been an increase in stabbings since I went to school here?" the healer inquired.

"I don't know," Severus answered, while shrugging out of his school shirt, exposing his deplorable undershirt. Lily frowned. If anyone needed new underwear, it was Severus.

Rather than removing it, he pulled up the front and pointed, "This is the worst, here on my stomach."

Pulling at the already stretched out collar, he continued, "Then there's up here where I was splashed from the other cauldron when it dropped onto my table."

Lily couldn't see anything because Severus' back was to her. She stood up and came around to get a look, but his undershirt was already back in place. She could see some darker green peeking out on his collarbone.

"Perhaps, I should take you back to St. Mungo's."

"I have detention tonight."

"For what?"

"Getting assaulted in Potions."

"The school knows you are in some altercation and gives you detention, but leaves you with burns?"

"Pain builds character," he mimicked in a falsetto voice while sneering.

"Then you really are going to St. Mungo's, Snape. I want to update your file properly, besides checking out your respiration. I can still hear you wheezing a bit. Any marks from that old character-building stab wound?"

"Back of my left shoulder," he answered. Holding his thumb and forefinger apart, adding, "The one that's this long."

Spleen decided to push up the sleeve rather than pulling the neck over. Guessing he found the right one, he asked, "And if this happened at school, why do you have any mark at all?"

"Why wouldn't I?"

Although he knew his patient was being intentionally dense, it was a relevant question, and certainly would change the direction of the inquiry that the hospital had opened up with Magical Law Enforcement. They were allowed to open it without the patient's consent when they were not yet seventeen. Snape's refusal to give information on how he was repeatedly injured made them suspect his home. Since practically everyone went to Hogwart's, that had not been considered as the source of Snape's injuries.

"Get dressed. I'll get you clearance to floo back to the hospital with me." Turning, he asked, "So Evans, any scalds, burns, or eye gouges you'd like me to take a look at?"

"Not today."

Lily's exam was rather quick, and she did not need to get undressed. With her chart being updated, more of the same potion for her skin was prescribed. He had brought a couple bottles with him anticipating this, and gave them to her.

"Alright then. Let me get you signed out of here, Snape, then we'll get you sorted."

While they waited for Healer Spleen to return, Lily said, "I have another prefect meeting after this, or else I'd insist that I come too, Sev."

Severus shook his head slightly, "That's alright. I just want it to stop hurting, Lily. Burns always seem worse somehow."

This was the first time today that Severus admitted that he was in pain to her. Did it hurt him that much, or was he starting to tell her things that he wouldn't before? He would usually sulk at a distance, cover his face with his hair and refuse to discuss any injuries.

Spleen returned, making a face at them, before saying, "You know, I am a healer. I expect some respect rather than being treated like an ignoramus. So we'll head over to where my expertise means something. If you can sit tight for a bit there before I get you sorted, Severus, I think I can raise the stakes for them around here so you might be able to get some timely care in this petty fiefdom. If I get treated this way, I can only imagine the level of concern that goes on in this place."

Lily looked at the healer. Was today all just a dream? Or maybe this evening, that's when things seemed really strange. A coordinated effort to stop the Marauders from doing whatever they wanted, and someone wanted to ensure Severus was able to get emergency medical care, just in case Black or Potter tried to remove one of his limbs next? She silently waved goodbye. She could overhear Pomfrey noisily sorting out a cabinet so decided to just leave.

She would have told Severus what the meeting was about, but she didn't want to raise his hopes unnecessarily. Lily drifted out of the Infirmary to meet the others at Prof. McGonagall's office. She was going to have to spend all weekend on homework, since she wasn't getting a single bit of it done tonight, and had another three classes tomorrow. After just one week back, Lily was beginning to admit seven classes was too much.

Prof. McGonagall admitted them. In attendance were Prof. Flitwick, both the Head Boy and Head Girl, Wilkes, and the two Ravenclaw and one Hufflepuff prefects that also took NEWT level Potions with them.

"Prof. Slughorn is unavailable till next week, but I understood the urgency to resolve this matter," Prof. Flitwick explained. "My Ravenclaws feel that the atmosphere of their class is not conducive to learning with two dangerous students present who flout basic safety for the sake of a few laughs."

Lily felt her lip curl up in a sneer. Slughorn wasn't available? Since when did heads of house become unavailable for days? She didn't blame McGonagall for not hanging out in their common room, because frankly it was a stinky cesspool once the boys got comfortable, but Lily felt she would be accessible, if needed.

The Ravenclaw Head Boy spoke up, "If all the prefects present, from all four houses I might add, verify the perils this class is asked to endure for the sake of a NEWT, we hope that you will take this under serious consideration to improve the conditions."

"Or else my parents go to the Board," the Ravenclaw female prefect swore. "We need these NEWTs, but not at the risk of our lives."

"We are here to listen to what you have to say," Prof. McGonagall intoned. This sort of house unity was in short supply these past few years. It was unfortunate that it was her the behavior of her own house that was bringing the others together. She would have punished these boys more severely some time ago, if it wasn't for the Headmaster's leniency. If he continued to give them a second, third, and fiftieth chance at turning themselves around, what message was he sending out, other than there was no real punishment forthcoming?

"This isn't about house rivalries," Wilkes began. "Evans has been with me in Potions for years, and she's never once caused trouble … except maybe for her old partner now and again, but none of us is in danger from her throwing things around the room, or wanting to set something on fire for kicks.

"I'm a Slytherin prefect, and my head of house does not believe me over Black and Potter. I'm not talking about points even. I'm arguing about what's right, and to protect myself and my fellow students. There is a tangible safety hazard having either of them in class with us."

"Exactly. Black got into a fist fight with a student for attempting to put out another student that Potter set on fire this morning. And it was my fellow Hufflepuff. It wasn't a house rivalry thing. Someone was on fire. What house someone's in isn't important when someone's on fire."

"Wasn't Professor Slughorn present?"

"Yes, and he didn't care. If it's not someone that's showering him with gifts and kissing his arse, than he's not even worth taking a piss on to put that fire out."

Prof. McGonagall and Prof. Flitwick were aware that Horace had his favorites, but saying that he'd intentionally ignore a student in need was stretching the truth more than a bit.

"Let Potter go to the Infirmary because he got a little burn knocking over another student's cauldron when he pushed him into it."

"What about …?"

Lily interrupted, "Severus is at St. Mungo's right now. That's why he's missing his detention that Prof. Slughorn gave him."

"Mr. Snape was in my class this afternoon," Prof. Flitwick said in confusion.

"He was refused medical care at lunch. I escorted him there myself, and Madam Pomfrey told him to wait till his check up this evening because 'pain builds character'," Wilkes complained. "She wouldn't even look at him."

"How did he end up at St. Mungo's?" Prof. McGonagall asked.

"When the healer checking our dragonpox saw the potion scalds, he wanted Severus to return to the hospital with him," Lily explained. She wanted to say a lot more, but she didn't want them to forget the facts. Sev was burnt this morning, waited till lunch, was denied care, and when a healer did look at him, hauled him in to hospital.

"For now, I can excuse Mr. Snape from detention. I will also make recommendations to Prof. Slughorn regarding the enforcement of safety rules in his classes," Prof. McGonagall announced.

"We insist this be acted upon swiftly," the Slytherin Head Girl said, speaking for the first time. "Too much is allowed to just slide. They are attacking female students again, after the lack of reprisals last year. Two of my house ended up with more punishment than those goons."

"All four of them, even though two weren't present, will be in detention for a long time," Prof. McGonagall assured them. She had zero tolerance for this, but without the Headmaster's approval she couldn't expel anyone. No one saw Pettigrew actually cast a spell at Evans.

"Will there be any chance of real corrective measures?"

"Yeah," the Hufflepuff prefect piped up, "What if Evans had been alone out there? No Slytherins, no fourth years … just her and those two brutes."

Lily was aghast. Black and Pettigrew? Yes, they would, wouldn't they? Probably explain they raped her as a favor so Severus wouldn't want her anymore, and expect pats on the back from all the Gryffindor fellows for a job well done. Her heart said that Severus would not abandon her, but how could she ask that of him, if that ever happened? Lily couldn't imagine anyone loving her as unconditionally as Severus, except her parents.

She was so involved in her own thoughts, that she missed the end of the meeting. All the other students were leaving. Remaining where she was till they left, Lily asked, "Prof. McGonagall, can I drop out of Care of Magical Creatures?"

Lily had not invested any time into the class other than reading the text and attending two classes so far this year. This was the least painful course for her to drop, and would remove the temptation of being attacked while alone. There was no class heading down the hill because it was lunchtime after her class. This was not cowardice, it was practicality.

***********************************

Severus sat in the hospital pajamas on a bed in St. Mungo's scowling at Alastor Gumboil from Magical Law Enforcement. He had done nothing wrong today, but now had to answer all these questions before a healer would touch his injuries. If he had known, Severus would have stayed at Hogwart's. If Potter and Black could wriggle out of attacking a pub full of muggles, why would anyone care that they threw hot potions on him in school? Slughorn would verify any story they made up.

The only recompense he received were a couple bottles of stout, before Spleen was finally cleared to heal these scalds.

Although physically better, Severus felt all these procedures were wasteful. If nothing else, somewhere along the line this whole thing was going to get all turned around and it would somehow be his fault.

***********************************

Annoyed by McGonagall and Flitwick being so difficult, when she had already made up her mind, Lily reached Gryffindor tower a couple minutes after curfew. She was mad enough that she might just do her homework inside the portrait hole waiting to take points from any toerag that thought they were above the rules.

Peter Pettigrew was kneeling on the floor in the middle of the common room in just his briefs. Only female students were in the common room, which was as clean as it was in the morning after the house elves had scrubbed it overnight.

"Evans!" he squeaked, hoping for a reprieve.

"Here you are, Lily," Helen proclaimed. "_Wormtail _has been waiting for almost an hour to sincerely apologize to you." The girls snickered at the intentional misuse of Pettigrew's Marauder nickname.

Seeing no reason why he shouldn't, Lily crossed her arms and waited to hear it.

A couple well-placed stinging hexes didn't force the words out of his mouth, so Mary used the old Marauder favorite, the super stretching wedgie jinx. Even magically enhanced waistbands cannot withstand the force of that classic.

Pettigrew yowled while the ladies laughed. Maybe now he wouldn't think it so funny to cast it on little first and second years.

Lily felt a moment of pity when she saw Pettigrew was crying and trying to simultaneously cover both his worm and his bum with his hands, but would Black and him have cared if she cried after what they did to her? No, they would have kept laughing, and laughing, and told moronic jokes about it for weeks, and laughed some more.

"Well, toerag? I don't have all evening to watch you blubber."

Smirking, Helen said, "Maybe you won't sneak out of detention tomorrow, Pettigrew."

"You snuck out to avoid getting punished on your first night?" Lily asked indignantly. Everyone was right, there was no penalty for these toerags. They just strolled out of detention now. Obviously the students could only take matters into their own hands at this point, if the school would do nothing to protect them.

Pettigrew mewled, "P P P Padfoot …"

"We're real Gryffidors and not scared of your thug friends, Pettigrew. They shouldn't have started this with one of us. And just remember, they are the ones that upped the stakes this morning by setting another student on fire. We'll make sure you boys wake up all nice and toasty in your beds, if you even point your wands at us again."

"Let's see your parents fix that with a sack of galleons or their Ministry friends."

"Won't have any hairdos to get mussed on your crispy corpses when you get buried with your sodding Nimbus brooms."

Crying harder, Pettigrew choked out, "But I did … did … didn't ..."

"He who laughed loudest, is now going to cry loudest, if you don't get on with it, Wormtail."

Forcing the words out, he cried, "I'm sorry. So sorry, Evans."

His words did nothing for Lily. She didn't know why she had thought they would. Pettigrew didn't mean them.

"Yeah," she replied, "And that'll be ten points for streaking in the common room, Pettigrew."

"What?" he weeped.

"No one wants to see the worm. It's ridiculous."

" A silly flobberworm."

Still sniffling, Pettigrew started making his way towards the boys' staircase that was being strictly guarded to disallow any of the male Gryffindors from trying to rescue Pettigrew. The staircase itself made such a superb bottleneck that there hadn't been a peep from any of them in the past fifteen minutes, after they made multiple attempts to descend before they realized how futile it was. Besides, it was only Pettigrew.

Sighing, Lily headed up their staircase to avoid looking at the smiling girls. Fighting embarrassing bullying with equally embarrassing bullying? This could not be the solution.

Helen came up soon enough and complained, "Berk came swanning in like a hero because he ditched detention. Evan's got it too for pounding on Black. I knew Black was all talk. When someone backs it up with a couple fists, he's a wuss."

"Hmm," Lily replied while thinking.

"So for Saturday, have you given any thought to what you and Snape were going to do?"

"Saturday?"

"Hogsmeade?"

"Oh, I don't know. Did you uh, need some alone time?"

With a wink, Helen hinted, "Maybe. Malcolm's already turned seventeen."

"What difference does that make?"

"He can buy something a little stronger than butterbeer, and at the Hog's Head that barkeep doesn't pay much attention to who ends up drinking it."

"Um, well, I don't want Severus drinking."

"Not him. Us. We're going to get a room upstairs so no one bothers us."

Lily blurted out, "A room?"

"Yeah, we can hang up there, eat, drink and you know … make merry."

"How merry?"

"Depends."

"I don't think that's a good idea," Lily commented.

"Well, I'm not asking you, mum. Just thought you'd want to know in advance, so we don't get our signals crossed."

If Severus beat up one of the Marauders with his hands or his wand, Lily would not consider getting a room to 'make merry' with him. That was just so … so caveman. You strong man, me appreciative woman. This was the 1970s, and women were free to do anything they wanted.

Lily said, "I'll see what he wants to do."

"You don't have to give him a choice, Lily. He should be grateful you'd even be seen with him in Hogsmeade."

Lily shook her head while she took out her pajamas. She didn't want to hear this nonsense again. Severus was green, and she was green. Couldn't insult one of them, without insulting the other, could she?

***********************************

The next morning, Lily sat with Severus in the back of Transfiguration again. She was happy that they healed him at the hospital. He was still on the same oily potion because his skin had not improved enough yet to use the cream that Lily was on.

Lily was secretly pleased that Severus was being forced to wash his hair everyday. She still had to think up a clever way of suggesting he continue, if he stopped once he no longer had to rub this solution into his scalp every night.

Before they parted ways after class, Lily suggested, "Do you want me to grab us lunch so we can eat outside before Herbology again?"

"Alright, I'll meet you in the Front Hall," Severus replied before Lily ascended into North Tower.

***********************************

Black, Potter and Pettigrew were held back in Transfiguration. Prof. McGonagall told them, "Your priviledge to go to Hogsmeade tomorrow has been revoked. Students are dropping out of classes because of your antics now."

"Who cares?"

"The school cares. Better students then you should not have to choose between their education and their safety."

"We got dates."

"I don't care. Now get moving, or I will find something for you to do the rest of today till your detentions."

Grumbling, they left while talking about what stupid ass got them in trouble this time. Snape? Nah, the had done worse things to him before in Potions. Probably some scared Hufflepuff or Chickenclaw. When they found out, there was going to be payback.

They had gotten a bunch of giggly fourth years to agree to go with them to Hogsmeade. After a quick twirl through Zonko's and Honeydukes, they'd be sitting on their laps in that back corner booth of the Three Broomsticks. Buy them a couple butterbeers and they'd be melting in their hands. They weren't taking them out for their conversation, but for the squeals and giggles. There would be none of that tomorrow, unless they talked up some second years … uh, no. Definitely not, they didn't want giggly twelve year olds who still played with dolls.

Checking the Marauder's Map, they started to plan how they were not staying in the castle, when there were girls going to be waiting for their marauding hands tomorrow. Remus should be let loose by Pomfrey about lunchtime today. He'd have to escort the ladies to their love nest tomorrow that they'd get all set up for a real good time, so they wouldn't miss not being seen on the arms of the most eligible bachelors of Hogwart's by all their jealous friends. Bad boys could always make it worth their time.

***********************************

Severus was waiting for Lily in the Front Hall when she arrived with her Herbology items and a packed lunch.

He said, " We should sit somewhere different today, so we're not predictable."

Before she had time to consider this a good idea, Lily was already making a face. Severus was not being unreasonable, just cautious. They knew Remus Lupin saw them together last week. He probably wouldn't be back till Sunday or Monday because that would give him an extra two days with his family.

Today they walked past the greenhouses to find a more secluded spot, but Lily insisted they stay in the sun. It would be too chilly in the shade to sit on the ground.

Severus laid out his cloak again, and they both sat down. Lily took the food out and offered Severus first choice of what she had brought along.

"What do you want to visit in Hogsmeade tomorrow, Sev?"

"The quill shop. I need more ink and parchment."

"You waste a lot of parchment on Arithmancy."

"Waste?"

"Well, not waste, but you use a lot of it up."

When Severus didn't reply, Lily continued, "Anywhere else?"

"No. Wherever you want to go is fine, Lily."

"I think the girls were talking about lunch at the Hog's Head. It's not as nice as other places."

"Lunch? I thought they were going there to either get in some heavy snogging and groping, or even a shag."

"Shag?" blurted out Lily.

"Perhaps. Drinking leads to shagging."

"Maybe we should go along just in case."

"In case of what?"

"Helen and Mary don't want to do that."

"Can't they say 'no' for themselves?"

"Well, yes they can, but what if your friends don't act like gentlemen?"

"Why wouldn't they? If you said 'no' to me, I'd listen to you."

"You aren't typical, Sev."

"If they said 'no', and Wilkes and Rosier did not listen, there wouldn't be any dates after tomorrow. I think they want to see more of MacDonald and Parkin."

"They won't base that on whether they say 'yes' or 'no', would they?"

Severus shrugged, "They finish up in the library quickly so I think it's been 'yes' all week."

"Not 'yes' to that."

"I wouldn't know."

"You don't talk about it?"

"Others ask, but Wilkes and Rosier don't go blurting out answers."

"I should hope not."

"Then why did you ask if they talk about it?"

"I thought maybe they said something to you."

"Not details. Just that the two of us might be more comfortable going somewhere else."

"But you weren't told expressly that we couldn't?"

"No, but why would we?"

"We're going to eat lunch too, and I'd feel better if I knew Mary and Helen were … I don't know, comfortable with everything before we left."

"If that's what you want."

"We can go to Scrivenshaft's after lunch then. It's close to the Hog's Head."

"Herbology?"

"You didn't kiss me yet, Sev."

Without complaint, Severus leaned forward and brushed his lips against Lily's for a moment before pulling back.

"Perhaps when we get back from getting your ink, we can use that room on the sixth floor tomorrow before everyone gets back."

"Don't you have homework?"

"Same as you, but I think we can get a bit done tonight and tomorrow morning, so we'll have plenty of time."

"We'll see."

"Yes, we will. And I'll be cracking the whip to keep you from dawdling."

"With homework or in Hogsmeade?" Severus asked as he stood up.

"Both, Sev," Lily teased, holding out her hand for Severus to assist her.

Lily was surprised that Remus Lupin was in Herbology. He was alone at the table they shared last week, and looked unwell.

"What are you doing back, Lupin? Thought you'd stay out till Monday."

"Didn't want to miss Hogsmeade, Evans," Remus kidded.

Lily stared at him. He could miss school for a critically sick relative, but rushed from their bedside to visit Zonko's? Lupin was as big a toerag as any of the others. She hoped his Filibuster thing blew up while it was still in his pocket.

Severus joined Lily, even though Lupin was here being an idiot. Hogsmeade, yes, of course, with Potter and Black throwing their galleons around, no one would want to miss out on the bounty they bestowed upon all their fawning admirers.

While they were setting up, Lupin stuttered, "Uh, Snape … do you … well, could I borrow your Ancient Rune notes from class?"

"Hell no."

"But uh …," he looked imploringly at Evans for a moment, before explaining, "I'm the only Gryffindor in the class."

Annoyed, Severus said, "Still reviewing Cuneiform and its evolution. It's in the text." Lupin didn't offer to give him any notes when he missed a whole month. Probably asked to make him look bad in front of Lily, and then if he relented, Lupin would wipe his arse with his notes. What kind of fool did Lupin take him for?

Like the week before, Lily directed the two boys on what they were doing once Prof. Sprout gave them their instructions.

It wasn't until they were walking back up to the castle after class that Lupin realized that there was a new breeze blowing at Hogwart's. He had taken his robe off to cool down after the warm greenhouse, and was walking with the others, like he did last week. One of the Hufflepuff prefects commented, "You missed a belt loop, Lupin. Five points from Gryffindor."

"What?" Lupin asked, stopping and feeling around the back of his waist.

"You did, Lupin," Lily said. "Don't bother arguing."

"I wasn't, but it's just a belt loop ..."

"Too bad."

"Can't you …?"

"No."

The Hufflepuffs chorused, "Have a happy detention."

"Detention?" Remus asked. How did he get detention for missing a belt loop?

"Oh, you were in such a rush to get to Herbology, you don't know the deal your buddies negotiated for you? That's just so sad that you missed their brilliant new jinx that they cast on me," Lily said, without the least trace of sadness in her voice.

Lily's intent was punctuated for Lupin with Snape's smirk. What had the rest of the Marauders been doing now? Didn't James tell them to not cast anything at Evans?

"So you don't need to cast it yourself, Lupin, I'm wearing light blue knickers today. Yesterday they saw my pink ones."

Snape's eyes dared him to cast anything, rather than expressing surprise at Evans' choice of conversation. Why would James cast a jinx to show off Evans' knickers? Lupin may not be wise to the ways of women, but any dope on the street would know that is not the way to woo them. How could Prongs be so stupid?

"Well, I guess I ought to get to the bottom of this then," Remus muttered. "I'll see you later, or whenever."

"I'd rather not be seen by you and your pack of animals. Have a good time in detention."

Once he was out of earshot, Severus asked Lily, "They got detention?"

"Yes. Dumbledore was out yesterday and they had to face Prof. McGonagall. By the way, I don't think they'll be sneaking out of detention tonight, Pettigrew was caught last night, and it wasn't pretty."

"Mr. Filch doesn't do pretty."

Lily smirked back at him. She didn't feel like correcting her friend. Bullying Pettigrew still sat uneasily on her conscience. There wasn't much she could have done since he was already caught and stripped by the time she saw him. She doubted Potter, Black, Pettigrew and Lupin had any such pangs about doing that to Severus.

***********************************

James and Sirius were able to get an appointment to see Dumbledore now that he was back at the school, and the four of them went to his office after dinner to straighten out this detention thing that they had negotiated with McGonagall. She had been totally unreasonable, and they weren't gaining points fast enough. The magical placard under their empty house hourglass now had them at negative 65. This keeping track whenever they went below zero was going to be the death of them.

Old sourpuss McGonagall came to fetch them. They didn't need her there. She was such a downer, and a stickler for the rules.

"Well, while I was down in London, it seems you fellows were busy again, even though you are still on probation. Due to your house's lack of points due to you and your fine example, Gryffindor does not care that Hogwart's has rules. Rules that are in place for a reason."

"It wasn't us," protested Sirius. "We didn't cast anything at Evans."

"We were framed by Slytherins who just wanted a reason to gang up on us," Peter added.

"That's not quite all you did yesterday. Prof. Slughorn confessed that Black and Potter took advantage of him being distracted to attack Mr. Snape in Potions."

Prof. McGonagall sternly added, "Then Black attacked the nearest student that tried to render him aid after Potter set him on fire."

Remus had not heard about this. They had told him about Evans and how Mulciber, Avery, Wilkes, Rosier and Snape beat up Black and Pettigrew, pretending they hadn't set the whole thing up. And then, how Pettigrew was caught last night by some angry girls in the hall that dragged him into the second floor ladies where they stripped him, but then Wormtail ended up seeing a little hot action because they couldn't stay mad at him once he was naked. The rest of the meal was spent talking about their plans for Hogsmeade, since only Remus could be seen there.

James shrugged, "He wasn't on fire long. Snape put himself out."

Laughing, Peter suggested, "If he wasn't so greasy, he might not have been on fire in the first place."

Prof. Dumbledore illuminated them, "Mr. Snape was injured enough that St. Mungo's has brought the treatment of students, or at least one student, at Hogwart's to the attention of Magical Law Enforcement. The school's under investigation, and it seems St. Mungo's knew exactly which student to focus their spotlight on. Madam Pomfrey and Prof. Slughorn are trying at this very moment to reconstruct what miscommunication has led to Hogwart's being under these allegations."

"Who gives a shit? It's Snape," Sirius said dismissively.

"Yeah, he's a liar. Make him drop it or you'll expel him," James said. It was that simple.

"St. Mungo's is authorized to report any injuries of minors. Mr. Snape did not file the complaint, nor can he drop it."

"Who told him he could go to St. Mungo's?"

"Madam Pomfrey. She mistakenly did not examine Mr. Snape herself earlier in the day, based on your story Mr. Potter, when you showed up injured and claimed that you were the only one hurt in Potions. When the healer from St. Mungo's was here for Miss Evans and Mr. Snape's dragonpox exams, he was concerned about the untreated injuries."

James racked his brain. Did he tell Madam Pomfrey that? He couldn't remember, but why would she not examine Snape? He probably spent more time in the Infirmary than anyone else at the school. She probably knew every disgusting greasy inch on his pimply body.

"Oh Merlin! How long is Snape going to milk that dragonpox thing?" asked Sirius. If he had known then what he knew now, he never would have cast the stupid spell.

"Mr. Snape is not the one in detention, gentlemen. It's you. Yesterday you negotiated with me that you would attend detention every evening for at least two hours, even on weekends, until Gryffindor house was able to maintain some points for over a week. You also agreed that any points that could not be subtracted due to our house being at a near constant zero, would be tracked. Isn't that why we are here?"

"Yes, we'd like to renegotiate with Prof. Dumbledore present," James said pleasantly.

"And to contest some of these point deductions," Sirius added. "The whole school is unfairly singling out our house."

"Hmm, well Prof. McGonagall came prepared with a listing of the Gryffindor point additions and subtractions for the past week. Let me take a look at it." Prof. Dumbledore looked down at the last entry and asked, "You didn't miss a belt loop, Mr. Lupin?"

"No, I did," Remus replied. It was silly to lie for five points, and might warm them up to the rest of what they were here to talk about. Remus wasn't even there to get assigned this detention. He'd serve it with his friends, but it was unfair.

"Do you see how Mr. Pettigrew was losing points last night when he was supposed to be serving detention?" Prof. McGonagall asked.

"Quite an accomplishment to be simultaneously working for Hagrid and race around the Gryffindor common room," Dumbledore said, while fondly remembering his own antics when he was a Gryffindor himself. That was when streaking was an art form, and he was the artist. Ah, those were some good times. Perhaps he'd recreate one of his greatest performances using a giant pudding to show today's students how it was done. Much simpler times then, when no one was getting hurt, and house rivalry was friendly, not this open warfare. It was no wonder that Madam Pomfrey claimed this afternoon that she was overworked and couldn't keep up with all that was going on in the school with all the students constantly getting hurt.

Flipping through the pages of parchment, mostly of deductions, Dumbledore observed, "Gentlemen, it seems you did not gain a single point for your house during this period of time. Have you gained any at all this year? It seems a lot of these deductions are for you four. There's others, so I'm not necessarily singling you out as the sole problem, but if you are not gaining any points for Gryffindor, why would you expect the rest of your house to cover all your losses?"

James proudly said, "Prof. Kettleburn gave me five points twice last month."

"Oh yes, that reminds me," Dumbledore said while holding up a finger. "Student complaints regarding your lack of concern for the safety of others. Any more accidents in Potions, and you will be suspended from the class until Prof. Slughorn allows you to return. Also, any acts deemed intentional by the instructor during any practical practice, and you'll be removed from those classes also.?

"We need those NEWTs," Sirius protested.

"Yeah, we're going to be aurors and Potions is required," James agreed.

"Can't you kick Snape out of Potions? He's the clumsy one," Sirius falsely accused.

"The rest of your NEWT level classmates are concerned about themselves. Once again, it was not Mr. Snape lodging the complaint, nor is he the student that dropped out of a class due to you," Prof. McGonagall explained. It would be so much simpler to expel these four, rather than waste time with this charade. "You also attacked him, yet continue to deny it. Five prefects are in your Potions class from all four houses. All of them presented themselves as witnesses to protest his detention."

James was puzzled. The Gryffindor prefect was Evans. Why would she back Snape over her own house?

"He must have threatened them," squealed Peter. "He's a death eater and can cast the killing curse." Seeing everyone look at him like he was crazy, he added, "Snape cast it at me."

"I guess when he saw your naked double last evening, when he knew you were in detention, Pettigrew, his natural instincts must have taken over," Prof. McGonagall replied sarcastically. Albus better get to the point soon. She had better things to do then spend an evening listening to these boys' lies.

"That's neither here nor there. Mr. Pettigrew has miraculously recovered. We're here to discuss this detention deal since you expressed a preference for possibly unending detention over getting expelled, gentlemen? So let's see, two hours still gives Mr. Pettigrew too much time on his hands obviously. I think it should be at least three hours a night, and we should stick with it including weekends. That'll give the house elves a chance to stay caught up rather than filling your special orders and the resulting extra cleaning your common room requires.

"Alright, now I feel the twenty points is just too low. I am proud to be a Gryffindor, and I'm positive you can get them up to fifty points, can't you fellows? Aren't you proud of your house? Don't you owe it to them to recoup all the points you've lost them over the years? I'm sure Prof. McGonagall would love having the House Cup back in her possession too. You don't want her to think back to you four and see you as a bleak period for her house, do you?"

"We weren't looking to increase our punishment, Professor," James complained.

"I thought you'd boys would be up to a challenge. You already did a fine job laying the framework for it. I see I'm mistaken and you'd rather be expelled?" Dumbledore said with a cheerful look on his face.

"What about Hogsmeade tomorrow?" Sirius asked. They had to get some concession.

"Hogsmeade? Hogsmeade visitation is a priviledge. I agree with Prof. McGonagall. Only Mr. Lupin will be allowed to go, if he wishes. It will only be for tomorrow since it is rather unfair that you originally negotiated this on his behalf. For future Hogsmeade outings, you four will only be allowed to participate if you have met the conditions to no longer be serving detention, and you are not on suspension from any of your classes.

"So we're in agreement now? You prefer detention and denial of privileges over getting expelled?"

Seeing as they had little choice for now, they agreed. Once this investigation into the school was cleared up, Dumbledore would back to his normal self, and probably apologize for being so unnecessarily hard on them. This was all Snape's fault again.

***********************************

Remus descended the stairs to go to the Front Hall. He was absolutely against his friends' plan for him to lead their dates to meet them in the Shrieking Shack from Hogsmeade. His mates already headed over through the whomping willow entrance to clean and brighten it up and set up the fine picnic lunch they had gotten from the kitchens. They thought the Shack would be brilliant to show how daring they were to younger girls.

If they were caught, Potter, Black and Pettigrew would be in Hogsmeade, even though they got there through a secret passage. Secondly, Remus did not like the Shrieking Shack. He did not want to do anything with a girl in the building purposely allocated for his use during his werewolf transformation, even if all he planned to do was eat lunch with them.

Remus wasn't even sure who was his date. They had practically asked every female in the school from third to seventh year to go with them. Sirius was sure it was some fourth years, but he couldn't even remember what house they were in. Maybe he should just wait here elevated on the bottom step, and see which group of girls approached him.

It didn't take long for some young girls to come over.

Pointing at the girl next to her, one said, "Tell her, I'm Sirius Black's date."

"No, I am."

"I am, you whore."

"No, he asked me on Monday."

"I don't care. I'm going with Potter. He promised to give me a ride on his Nimbus broom."

"No, I am."

"Aw hell no. We're having a picnic over on the quidditch pitch, then he's going to fly me down to Hogsmeade. Potter and I are going to Zonko's, Honeydukes, and then having a butterbeer at the Three Broomsticks."

"Settle down over there," yelled Prof. McGonagall to be heard over the din of arguing girls.

"There must be some mistake," Remus said. He wished Sirius and James were here. They would sort this with a couple words and smiles.

"Where are they, Lupin?"

"Uh … well, they wanted me to take you to meet them, but uh … they didn't give me names."

"They surely said mine, didn't they?"

"What about me?"

"No, me!"

"Black kissed me. I'm definitely his date."

"Potter kissed me."

"When was that? He kissed me on Tuesday."

"He kissed me yesterday."

As the noise rose again, even though other students had left, leaving Remus with over thirty third and fourth years all clamoring that they were either James Potter's or Sirius Black's date for the day, Prof. McGonagall yelled, "Quiet!"

Mr. Filch shuffled over and was wearing a grin as he asked, "What's your problem now, Lupin?"

"Uh, no problem, Mr. Filch, I was uh … just waiting for someone."

"Maybe you should wait outside? The acoustics of the stone in here echo all the higher pitched voices."

"Uh, yeah, you're right."

Not giving up, the young ladies followed, all trying to get his attention to clarify who was here to wait for Potter and Black and who should get lost because they were wasting their time.

When Prof. McGonagall caught wind of the altercation, she rectified the matter. "Potter, Pettigrew and Sirius Black are not going to Hogsmeade today."

There was a massive outcry and many expressed outrage that they could have found dates if they hadn't been asked by these nasty pranksters who had no intention of going to Hogsmeade with any of them. Their tune quickly changed, and when the objects of their anger did not appear, the girls turned on their buddy, Lupin.

Remus had been considering going through the secret entrance to the Shrieking Shack to tell the others that the dates were off, but with twenty angry young female teens circling him, he had no choice but to continue down the road to Hogsmeade, unless he decided to go back in the castle. However, someone might realize that the other three Marauders were not at Hogwart's, if he didn't join them inside.

***********************************

Lily was sitting on a bench next to Severus outside Scrivenshaft's in Hogsmeade. She was trying to make her mind become as numb as her body. It just wouldn't slow down though. Lily was sure what they had done in the Hog's Head was bad because it had felt so bloody brilliant. Well, not as bad as Mary and Helen, they were actually shagging. Lily blinked trying to block those images from playing across the movie screen in her mind. She hadn't seen Malcolm's since Mary was on his lap facing him, but she had seen Evan because Helen was laying on the table in front of her in the private dining room they had hired for the afternoon.

She should have listened to Severus when he first suggested they go after lunch, but she was an idiot and insisted on staying a while longer. It could have been the mead. Everyone but Severus had been drinking it. There had been plenty, and it tasted really good. Sev had said it was too sweet for him when Lily tried to get him to try it. That should have been the first sign of danger when she was trying to get Severus to drink alcohol.

Without Severus, Lily would probably be giggling and laying on the table too. She couldn't believe she started unbuttoning her blouse when Mary's was just suddenly open, and Malcolm's hands and mouth were … well, whatever it was, Lily wanted that too, but Severus whispered in her ear something about not wanting to share the sight of her with anyone else. That might have been when she ended up in his lap, but still facing the table, unlike Mary. It was Severus that had refastened her blouse. Lily was sure it hadn't been her.

When she refused his suggestion that they go again, she pleaded for what? Lily couldn't remember. Severus whispered some questions to her, and Lily said 'yes' to everything, except leaving. It wasn't until after Severus did something with his fingers, but he didn't even put them inside her knickers. Isn't that when things like what happened … well, she was obviously wrong. Very wrong. Her bones melted away, and her body and mind exploded into what seemed like a million pieces.

Lily had been trying to inventory her body to make sure it was still here and existed today, when Severus asked her if she'd like to take a walk and get some air. She remembered she told him that she'd like to, but her legs wouldn't work. Then they were out here with Lily trying to get her mind to stop. Just stop.

Severus had been holding her hand this whole time and watching her. Was Lily mad at him? She never made sense at times. Lily wanted to be there, and was carrying on that she wanted him to make her a woman and some other nonsense because she wasn't used to drinking mead, and now she was not speaking to him and staring into space. Probably taking the time to rehearse her rant in her head so she didn't end up spewing out some drunken slurs that made absolutely no sense. If she had any wits left to her, she'd realize that screwing on a table in the Hog's Head while laying next to an equally drunk Helen Parkin who was doing the same thing was not absolute genius.

"Oy Snivellus! Got yourself an ugly green girlfriend?"

Two younger Gryffindor boys thought they were amusing till their first jinx did nothing against Severus' shield charm. They hadn't even seen him cast it. Sneaky Slythering ruining their fun by casting an unfair spell like that.

"Oooh, I've been waiting for this all day," Lily said, flicking her wand. The boys were now green, and their orange hair had been charmed to stand on end.

"They're missing something."

Lily didn't see any change until they turned to run off and tell. One of them had a parchment that said 'kick me' on his back, and the other's said 'kiss me'.

"That's so first year, Sev."

"Didn't want to intimidate the little cherubs. After all, haven't you told me it's only words, Lily?"

"Maybe I'm tired of hearing them. They were pretty dumb. Don't they think a prefect from their own house knows their names? Even they have to know there are only two green students at the whole school."

"You are giving them too much credit."

"Hmmm. Did you already get your parchment?"

"I would have to physically enter the store to make a purchase, Lily."

"Oh, well that's awfully old fashioned and inefficient. Much like quills and bottles of ink. We're going to have to give the wizarding world a kick in the pants when we graduate. I think ballpoint pens would knock them ass over tea kettle."

"I see you've been giving the blurb for your chocolate frog card some thought then," Severus commented as he opened the door for her.

"Well, yeah, Sev. I need a card to keep yours company."

"You'd come between me and Uric the Oddball?"

"Sure would. Wasn't that the bloke with forty pet augureys?"

"It may have been fifty, but either number is surely exaggerated."

"I agree. Either would be quite a mess. Do you need that much parchment?"

"I have some ideas I want to work on."

"Where do you find the time?"

"I don't sleep much."

"You'll get sick, Sev."

"Lucky for me, you are planning on being a healer."

"I don't want to make a career of taking care of you."

"I wouldn't mind spending my life taking care of you, Lily."

"Don't try to change the subject, Sev."

He shrugged and set his items down on the counter. Lily had picked up some new quills and ink too.

Lily asked as they exited the quill shop, "Back to Hogwart's?"

"Alright."

They were walking quietly, hand in hand, when Lily suggested, "It's not crowded in Honeydukes now."

Severus had remained outside while the other five browsed earlier. None of them actually purchased anything because he had been right. The place had been packed shoulder to shoulder with younger years who were just absolute gluttons and kept the shop help hopping and climbing with their requests. More students had been flowing in faster than orders were being filled.

"If you want to stop, that's fine," Severus replied with no enthusiasm.

As they went in, Lily asked, "What do you like best?"

"I don't want anything," he muttered. Severus was desperate to make money, not spend it. He only heard in the past week that the Ministry charged a fee for the apparition course, in addition to the license fee. More galleons to pay the salaries of people who did nothing for him.

Lily looked around for something not so bright and cheerful. "Pepper imps?"

"I've been fooled by one of them before. They don't taste like pepper."

"Well no, they taste like peppermint."

"I know that now."

"You want something spicy? An acid pop?"

"There's a difference between pepper and burning a hole in my tongue. Just worry about getting what you want. There's plenty left, even after that plague of locusts swept through."

Lily felt she was under a little pressure now. Would Severus judge her by what she chose? There was nothing wrong with peppermint, so she chose a package of the pepper imps and a bar of Honeydukes best chocolate.

After she paid, she asked him, "Well?"

"I'm ready to go," he answered and opened the door for her.

She walked out, knowing she shouldn't be annoyed at him. Lily was aware he didn't like candy before today.

On the walk back, Lily was trying to think of something to say. They had done a lot of homework before they went to Hogsmeade, but now she wasn't comfortable with her plan to go up to that dark storage room with Severus. Would he do whatever that was to her again? Or would she have to do something like that to him? Or would they shag now that no one else would see her? Severus told her yesterday that it was alright if she said 'no' to him.

"Maybe we can go sit in that window of yours up by Ravenclaw, Sev."

"Alright."

Other students were already back to the school, but they weren't hanging in the halls or on the stairways.

"View of the mountains?" Severus suggested at the first window.

"Sure, and this time let's sit a bit different. Um, yeah, you can put your legs up again, like before against the window," Lily directed. She sat next to Severus, but with her legs hanging into the hallway, rather than up on the sill.

"You are facing the wrong way to look out the window," he mentioned.

With an annoyed sigh, Lily rearranged herself by turning towards Severus and bringing her legs up and then in addition to making sure her legs were together and her skirt was in place, tucked her cloak firmly around everything from her waist to her calves.

"Better?"

Severus glanced into the hall then out the window, and replied, "I thought you'd might like the sight of the mountains better than a stone corridor. You didn't have to move, if you didn't want to."

Lily looked out and agreed, "It is lovely."

They sat together, and Lily noticed that although they were both facing the window, both of them were sneaking glances out of the corners of their eyes at each other. She wasn't going to find out what Severus was thinking unless they started talking.

She looked at him and began, "Earlier … in the uh … Hog's Head ..."

Severus' dark eyes looked into hers, and he continued, "I didn't do what you requested."

"Right," Lily said back to encourage him to go on. She was relieved he didn't do more when he could have, but knowing why was important to her. Was it because she was green and ugly now? Severus was green too.

His eyes unfocused for a moment in thought before he gazed at her again to explain. "I spend time thinking about us together. Trying to figure out what might be better for us, than other … stuff. I'm used to not having much, but I know you aren't so I think about what would make you happy, Lily.

"In all that, I also consider us being married and intimate. I believe that you are special, Lily, and I should treat you in a way to show you how I feel. I'm not forming any specific plans, but analyzing what would be extraordinary for the two of us, rather than following the steps Pomfrey gave us last week."

Lily didn't take her eyes away from his. If Severus spent time thinking about these things, no wonder why he couldn't sleep. Her friend analyzed everything. How many factors were there in considering how to make her happy? Lily didn't even know how to do it for herself.

Seeing that she didn't look confused or disgusted, Severus took a breath and continued, "I began thinking about us a while back so that was before we had dragonpox. So in my thoughts about how our first time would need to be memorable for the two of us, I didn't imagine us still recovering from dragonpox. Even after our condition became fact, and part of something I thought about, I was thinking that by spring, it'd be mostly cleared up.

"Although I am open to the possibility that something spontaneous could happen. Being green is something minor, if it was just that, I would have done what you asked, but there were others in the room, and that detracted from the possible experience, and than it's Hog's Head. Not even a bed, but on a bench or table? I think too highly of you to want that to be our memory of when we first made love. There would be plenty of times after, but there's only one first time."

Her mixed-up friend continued to perplex Lily. From what she thought she knew, wasn't he sounding more like a girl? Well, obviously not like a Gryffindor girl, if Lily was to go by Helen's and Mary's examples. What if they stayed with Wilkes and Rosier, Lily hoped they would now that they had gone this far, but would they be disappointed when they thought back to what they did in the Hog's Head?

"You're right, Severus. I'd like something more … romantic than a table at the Hog's Head. It doesn't have to be elaborate, but the two of us alone would definitely be advisable. Even though I agree that planning may take away from the experience, perhaps we can discuss … uh, things, rather than you being burdened with all this. I mean uh … I know you are good at um, thinking, but you might be overdoing it a bit because we haven't uh … I mean I haven't agreed to when … or even if, yes if, I'd agree to marry you."

"You've changed your mind?"

"No, I haven't changed anything, Sev. I just haven't made up my mind. I never said I would."

"Lily," Severus stopped and changed what he was going to say. "Lily, why did you ask me to have sex with you today, if you don't know?"

"It was … it was a mistake."

"Yours or mine?"

"What?"

"What if you make up your mind, and that turns out to be my one chance of being with you?"

"Severus, why does every conversation I have with you … turn so mental?"

"Perhaps it's due to you, Lily."

"I don't think so."

"You've admitted you don't know what you want. How should I react to that?"

"I need time to think about it. And even if my answer is yes, I don't want to be rushed."

"Why do you claim I'm rushing you? We've already discussed that I'm not rushing you to do anything. You ask for kissing and want to do things with your tongue in my mouth, and today when you said you wanted to shag, and it was me that convinced you that it was not the right time yet."

"You're mixing everything up, Sev."

"I think you are, Lily."

"I don't want to argue."

"Neither do I. However, I want to be clear. I think I have been, and you respond with physical affections that we did not share before. Perhaps that is what you really want from me? Am I a friend that you do homework with, but also snog and want to shag? You have no intention of making a permanent commitment with me? It's just a bout of teenage humping for a bit of fun, and then you'll be done with me when you graduate?"

"Severus, why do you need to be so negative?"

"Why shouldn't I be interested in what awaits me? You're telling me all I have is a maybe to look forward to, Lily."

"You have lots to look forward to."

"Without you, there isn't. I feel hollow and alone inside without you, Lily."

"That's why you need to be more outgoing."

"Why? If this is it, then why would I waste my time?"

"Is this is what?"

"If it means so little to you."

"I didn't say that."

"You're not saying much of anything."

"I am too."

"What, that I'm negative and mental? That's what you tell me when I won't do exactly as you say? I'm not a mindless slave, Lily. If you want that, marry into a family with house elves."

"I don't treat you like that, and I already said you were right earlier, Sev."

"Than what is all this about?"

"How do I know? I'm confused, Sev. I never felt anything like what you did to me earlier today. I don't even know for sure what you did other than just touch me. When there's so much I don't know, how can I be sure of what I want? And if I think I know what I want, is it right?"

"If you didn't like it, I won't do that sort of thing to you. You seemed to want something more than what we've done in the past, but didn't know what."

"I … I … that's just it. I felt so helpless, but I was with you. And the way it felt was so unexpected. Till then, everything I do with you felt wonderful, but now, there's this which was so much more than wonderful. It sort of scares me."

"That wasn't my intent."

"I know."

"If it was too much, than I won't. If you want to try something like that again, you can let me know when you are ready. As I said, I'm not rushing you and it's alright if you say 'no'. It won't feel amazing unless you are part of it, Lily."

"I don't want to turn into drooling and quivering mass of jelly, Sev."

"I'm not in the mood for joking around right now, Lily."

"The more I talk, the worse I am making this, Sev," Lily said as she leaned forward to hold him.

"I want to hear what you think, Lily," he said before sighing and putting his arms around her, allowing Lily to rest her head on his shoulder.

"I don't know what I think."

**********************************

At detention, they were still talking about how much fun it would have been to have all those girls following them around Hogsmeade. They would have taken over Zonko's, Honeydukes, and taken up every table in the Three Broomsticks. They would have been talking for years about the Marauders down in Hogsmeade.

When it came right down to it, after hours of discussion, they could only agree (ignoring Lupin's slight protests to the contrary) that this was all Snape's fault. He even had Dumbledore thinking badly of them. Their lying, scheming, slimy, dark arts-using, junior death eater nemesis who the whole school hated had raised the bar by somehow involving Magical Law Enforcement, just like he set them up over the summer to be caught when they were just having a spot of fun while on holiday.

To fight fire with fire, they'd have to be just as cunning. Since he was a Slytherin, he'd be too dense to realize that Gryffindors had brains too. They may have to wait a while, but they would settle for nothing less than getting Snivellus expelled this time.

Since Remus seemed the chummiest with him, his assignment, which would require more bravery and fortitude that they could rightly ask for the sake of friendship, was to be amicable to him in Ancient Runes and Herbology, and dig the dirt. Being absolutely friendless, Snivelly would be dying to tell all his secrets to someone now that he had a best mate.

When Remus tried to tell the others that Snape already had Evans as a best mate. They had a good laugh. A girl can't be a best mate, and besides James was still willing to give her another chance, in spite of Sirius and Peter telling him that she wasn't worth it. Once Evans knew she still had a chance at Prongs, she'd drop Snape like a bad habit. He'd write her a note, so she'd have written proof unlike all those silly girls earlier today, letting Evans know that he wasn't angry at her, and next Hogsmeade weekend, she'd be his date, even if she still was green. Now that would show some commitment and she'd finally take Potter seriously.

**********************************

Lily returned to her dorm room still shaking her head. There was stupidity, but than there was real stupidity. Why would all these girls think they had a date with Sirius Black and James Potter? The pranksters probably got themselves intentionally banned from Hogsmeade so they could watch the mayhem down in the Front Hall when the girls were finally told. They were probably up on one of the higher staircases watching, laughing so much they pissed their pants.

There was a lot of third year girls that had been sucked in by their joke, and they went and ruined their first Hogsmeade outing. Cruel toerags.

Helen and Mary were already upstairs and lounging in their nightgowns. They didn't look any different to Lily. There wasn't anything written across their faces, but they appeared … smug?

"Lily, hurry up and get changed, we're going to celebrate."

"Huh?"

"If you're still sore, I've got something you could take."

"Why would I be sore?"

"Uh, you don't have to be, just thought that maybe … you know."

"What are we celebrating?"

"The three of us, silly. All together on the same afternoon no longer being burdened with virginity."

Lily's mouth dropped open. They were going to celebrate, and they thought she … she … she did that too? "I … I mean we didn't … do that."

Helen said, "I thought as much. Even for Snape, he was being too quiet."

"How could I hear anything with Lily yelling his name, like she wanted to let all of Hogsmeade know?"

"I was not," Lily protested. She may have said it a couple times, but definitely did not yell it.

"You threw Evan off his game. He cast a silencing spell so no one came up to break down the door," Helen complained.

"I think they hear that sort of thing in the Hog's Head all the time," Mary kidded.

"Not that." In what Helen thought was a good imitation, she started breathing heavy and moaned, "Oh Sev … Oh Sev … no more, no oh Sev … but a lot louder. I'm keeping it down so the rest of Gryffindor tower doesn't hear."

"And then you screamed his whole name for a full minute at the end."

"I did not."

"It's alright, Lily. We hadn't realized that you and uh, Severus were … or had something special."

"You always said he was your friend from home."

"Yeah, don't think that we'd think you'd scream any bloke's name like that, Lily."

"Oh no, no, we know you're not that sort."

Lily was waiting for them to break out in giggles. They were kidding, right? As the silence grew, Lily explained, "Severus and I aren't … all he did was touch me a bit, he didn't, or he's never …"

"Well, we kind of thought he had to touch you if he wasn't giving you a ride on his broom, but what did you have to do in return … if you don't mind me asking?"

"Was it messy? Did you have to taste it?"

"What?"

"What did you do to take care of Severus?"

"Take care of him?"

"Yeah. He had you screaming out in ecstasy and trying to claw at the ceiling, and you in return … did what?"

"We went to buy parchment."

Helen and Mary looked at each other, Lily was hiding something.

"You may not have suspected but we were talking about you two ..."

"Well, more like asking Evan and Malcolm about Severus after you had left."

"You were talking about Severus while …?" Lily stopped.

"No. In between, silly."

"Yeah, we are trying to revise our opinion of him."

"For your sake, Lily. We're willing to admit that maybe you two together is the way it is."

"The way what is?" Lily asked. What happened to Severus being 'not good enough'?

"Serious between you. If he can make you feel like that by just touching you, I mean, he'd have to really mess up somewhere else for you to just throw that away."

"We know to most people he's just someone brooding in the back, but he does talk to you, and that's what's important."

"Yeah, Malcolm and Evan say he doesn't talk much, but when he does it's about schoolwork."

"They can only suspect how much hardship he's gone through with having practically nothing and being injured."

"He doesn't flaunt it, so even if you are one of the few who's seen it, Lily, no one's going to judge you because he's not … um, not perfect."

"No one's perfect," Lily muttered. Who were they to even talk about judging Severus or her? She didn't give a flying fig what other people thought.

"We hadn't even noticed back when uh, Black took away all his clothes."

"And now we realize how much crueler that was … they probably found out from doing that to him before, and then were just waiting to undress him again in public."

Lily was baffled. Even with his clothes on, Severus was not a portrait of physical well-being. Why would anyone be surprised that he was skeletally thin?

Before she could ask what exactly they meant, her roommates continued to ramble on with their half-baked acceptance. "So even if he asks you to do something that may seem odd, Lily, it's just that he feels comfortable with asking you and we can understand that living with … that, must be hard and that he's doesn't enjoy other things because he can't or he's confused."

"What are you talking about?" Lily got in. If there someone that was confused, it was Lily.

"We just wanted to let you know we'd understand that Severus may not care for the same things that a typical boy would want."

"Yeah, it's alright if he gets turned on by something else."

"But you did do something for him, Lily? Other than buying parchment, that is."

"No, we um, argued a bit."

"Lily! Of course he'd be upset, if you didn't want to do anything for him."

"If whatever he wanted was too much, wouldn't he settle for something else?"

"No. No. We argued about something that's been going on for months. Uh, he didn't ask me to do … um, anything to him."

"Maybe he was embarrassed. Be a Gryffindor, and see if he likes it."

"You could start with the regular things and then if he … I don't know, if you let him fondle your breasts and then he starts licking your um, armpits instead, well, could that be so bad?"

Seeing Lily's eyebrows draw together, Helen slowly asked, "Maybe you have no idea of what to do with him, Lily?"

"Well, I … or rather Severus is all twitchy so I just can't grab him."

"I guess he would be," Helen muttered as she pulled out her broom. "I know this is going to seem like blasphemy to molest my broom, but let me show you … down below this wider section with the name, is about right I think. Like you saw last week in that slide, it's like a sleeping serpent at first. Limp and soft, but after you rub it up and down a bit, it'll firm up. If he doesn't like this motion, or wants you to do something like twist your hand about, he should say something. We may be women, but we're not mind readers."

Helen was right. Lily was shocked that she was using her broom handle to demonstrate. To be sure, Lily asked, "I should put my hand in his trousers?"

"Or take it out, if there's no one around," Mary suggested. "That way you can see it, rather than just feeling it."

"And since it sounded like you can't concentrate when he's using his talented fingers on you, try it without his hand in your knickers at the same time at first. You can still hold his broom while he's doing that, but if you aren't doing anything but gripping it tight and screaming his name, I don't think he'll like it much. So at least concentrate on him the first time you do this, until you know what way works for him."

"You might want to try letting him do whatever he wants to you, so you know what parts of you he likes best."

Obviously, this sort of … behavior led to shagging. Lily was not looking to follow in Mary's and Helen's footsteps and further muddle Severus with this sort of thing. "We're doing fine just on our own, thanks. I don't think Severus would want me rubbing his broom like that."

"Have you tried it?"

"Maybe he really doesn't like it. Maybe he likes something that hurts a bit? I've heard about that."

"Or something up his bum instead?"

"We're not … uh, he's … what?"

Mary shrugged, "Some don't like it. We already said it's alright, Lily, but if you've never tried it, how are you going to … pay him back?"

"Pay him back?"

"Severus may be willing to do anything for you, Lily, but you aren't going to be able to keep him happy if all you do is take, take, take."

AN: I don't know if I hung with a more mature crowd in my younger days, but I did not hear "I see London, I see France, I see whoever's underpants" till university so I'm including the whole phrase down here.


	28. Chapter 28 Even The Stars Look Brighter

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 28 Even The Stars Look Brighter Tonight

Helen and Mary were driving Lily crazy. Both were smitten with their fellows from Slytherin. Lily thought that was wonderful, considering how far they had gone during the last Hogsmeade weekend, and whatever else they've been doing since then after they left the library every evening.

The problem was their radical mood swings. Some days they were trying to include Severus and Lily in their plans, other days they were angry with either Lily or Severus. Usually Severus, and their blokes weren't helping one way or the other so then there would be problems on that end too.

Lily found it ridiculous. They could have taken the opportunity to feign some friendliness towards Severus in the past five years, when he was only Lily's friend, but they hadn't. So now that they had reconsidered, or until Lily got someone else – another on and off project of theirs when they were especially ticked at Sev – they expected Severus to reciprocate.

Severus barely answered questions from his own roommates, why would he get chatty with hers? Lily felt Malcolm and Evan had the best idea which was to leave Severus alone. If he wanted to participate in something, he'd tag along. Usually when Lily thought it was a good idea. It did not work every time, but if they convinced Lily, Severus would follow unless it was a tremendously bad idea.

He considered any situation with prolonged physical contact a bad idea right now. Lily understood his explanation, in fact, she was not the least bit surprised when Severus claimed he would not be interested in resuming until she decided about them wedding. He was deaf to any argument she presented about other students and their dating activities. As time wore on, Lily was getting tired of his stubbornness.

She considered telling him 'yes' in order for them to get back to the occasional snog and whatever else caught their fancy, however Lily was concerned when Severus would not admit one way or the other whether he even enjoyed it. They were still holding hands, embracing and Lily could get in a brief kiss here and there, but anything further and he'd leave, unless it was in class. Obviously, Lily couldn't do much in class, though she did molest him a couple times in Potions, now that they were at the same table in the back of the room.

Prof. Slughorn had Potter and Black at the table in front of his desk, and he spent a lot of time staring at them. Lily doubted that anyone could pressure Prof. Slughorn into doing something he did not want to do because he had been at Hogwart's for a long time. There was no way they could even threaten to get rid of him. Besides, wasn't he comfortable here? Everyone knew where to send his gifts of candy, tickets, memorabilia, photos, clothing, and whatever else. Lily supposed he could do something at the Ministry; he had helped many of his former students get employment there.

Even stranger was Remus Lupin. If Lily hadn't seen it in Herbology twice a week, she'd think Severus' paranoia was getting the better of him. Lupin was chatting away like he was standing next to one of his Marauder mates, rather than Severus. He didn't talk about typical Marauder things like passing gas, toilets, dungbombs and quidditch. Lupin talked about the weather, food, holidays and homework and asked Severus a lot of questions. That's what was strangest of all. Lupin only directed his questions at Severus, not at Lily. Severus didn't answer, but Lupin kept talking and asking.

Severus told her he'd talk to him in Ancient Runes too. Kept sitting beside him and would walk next to him after class until he went down into the dungeons. During Charms and Defense, Lupin stayed with the other Gryffindor boys, so Lily did not understand. Even if Lupin had some sort of argument with his mates, why would he try to make them … jealous? … by talking to Severus. Wasn't that like a boyfriend / girlfriend type of ploy? Wouldn't he also need Sev to cooperate? So far, Lupin had not charmed his way to even see the perimeter fence with posted warning signs promising nasty consequences around Severus' defenses.

Others were picking up on the peculiarity of it. When Lupin purposely singled Severus out for a greeting in the library when they were at their usual table of six – the three Gryffindor girls with their three Slytherin fellows – Severus merely glared. However, once it appeared that nothing more was going to happen as Lupin kept going, Mary giggled that perhaps Lupin fancied Severus. The four of them discussed it with very broad assumptions, that Severus chose to ignore.

That was another thing that annoyed Lily. They had some theories about Severus. For someone they had totally ignored for years, it appeared that Mary and Helen were now trying to make up for it even if they had no facts on which to base their suppositions. When Lily would not help them out by getting further information to fill in all the blanks, she swore they figured out how to annoy her by formulating answers that had to be the furthest thing from the truth possible.

Since they were obsessed with families, the torrid tale of romance between Severus' witch mother and muggle father that they concocted had Lily ready to shove quills into her ears till they bled. Lily did not know how they met and got together, but there was no possible way any woman could be swept off her feet by Severus' father. And Severus' mother? A woman so overcome with passion that she was ready to face any odds to flout society's rules to be with her muggle lover? With Helen and Mary walking around with their heads in the clouds over Evan and Malcolm, they thought everyone else was motivated by their hearts now.

Of course, hearing such nonsense before bed got Lily thinking about Severus. He was not romantic, but Lily wouldn't call him practical either. Did he have any firm motivators? Severus liked being smart, but there were plenty of opportunities to show off that he let pass him by. Fame, infamy, notoriety? Even though they kidded about Chocolate Frog Cards, they were for children. There were also some that were just the loser cards like Herpo the Foul. Bad enough having a name that sounded like herpes, but than to have 'the foul' tacked on. Severus said he wanted to make her happy. Well, Lily would be happy if he stopped being such a obstinate git. It had been weeks since their trip to Hogsmeade.

At breakfast the next morning was another sappy love note from Potter. Lily tore it to little pieces again. What was his problem? She tore each one very obviously at the table for him to see while she glared at him. Lily was not going to fall for any of his nonsense, either written or verbal. He thought a couple weeks of being a model student would make her forget that he was a first class toerag? Potter may be able to smile, wink and joke around with others to get his way, but not her. Of course, Black and Pettigrew going berserk, because she dropped Magical Creatures, in their common room meant some of his little gang felt they still owed her some payback. In addition to any points she took from a Gryffindor. Lily was not as ruthless as some of the other prefects, but the Gryffindors were looking a lot sharper these days with hair combed, shirts tucked in, not a single belt loop missed, shoes shined … it was almost as if they were trying to exhibit some house pride. Lily also liked how clean their common room stayed without the four of them flinging stuff like they lived in the zoo's ape house.

Healer Pye had said that they were less green, but Lily did not notice a difference as she looked over at Severus. Last night was his first night on the non-oily concoction. His hair looked clean from here. The little club of younger Slytherins that still ate with him were excited about something. Lily hoped that Severus did not get into an altercation with Mulciber, Avery or those other Slytherins that were sitting in that death eater club meeting that one time they held one publicly here in the Great Hall. Lily still couldn't believe that they were still persisting with whatever started this because she still doubted it was over one black eye. Even though Severus said they mostly talked school work either during meals and late nights down in their common room, Lily was pleased there were no girls in the group. She did not think another girl could easily come between her and Severus, but Lily would rather not have to worry about something like that.

Curious about what they were up to, Lily decided that maybe Severus would like to head down to Potions early, or else she might have to wait till Charms to find out what happened.

Yes, they were definitely acting suspicious, Lily thought, as the whole group looked her way as she walked along the Slytherin table, and Regulus' blonde friend handed something back to Sev that he put in his bag. That boy looked a little odd and a bit flushed. Lily never saw him with this gleam in his eye, and he was licking his lips and talking at the same time.

"... wish I could be there to see his face," he was saying excitedly.

As Severus rose to join Lily, Regulus asked, "He reads The Quibbler?"

"He might now," was the giggling reply.

In her mind, Lily agreed with the tone of Regulus' question. The Quibbler was a magazine that would not be found in most homes in wizarding Britain. Although she had only seen one issue, and brought it to Severus as a joke, it was pure speculation at best, lies if one were to be unkind.

When they got outside the Great Hall, Lily asked, "I know you've probably mentioned his name before, but who's Regulus' friend again?"

"Um, Crouch. His father is the head of Magical Law Enforcement. His son doesn't see eye to eye with him, but his father's at work all the time with thing as they are right now so that's probably the main cause of his bitterness. He perceives that his father puts the Ministry before his family."

"Magical Law Enforcement that would take a lot of dedication. And with all the problems, even if they don't spell them out in the Prophet, well, they'd be really busy. Do you think they have a tough time getting applicants? It's probably a job that could mean putting your life on the line."

"Perhaps. There's cases now with whole families being attacked so safety anywhere is probably just an illusion."

"So you have a copy of The Quibbler and it has something that may be upsetting?"

"It's not upsetting to me, Lily."

Lily rolled her eyes at her friend. He was so bored when they were in hospital that he wrote a letter to the editor and they started corresponding. "Well, are you going to tell me, Sev?"

He shrugged, "You've already heard my views on the Ministry."

"All of them negative."

"I know you don't agree, Lily, so is that sufficient?"

"Is it something I should be concerned about?"

"I didn't write anything that you haven't heard me say."

"That Lovegood fellow printed one of your letters?"

"No, an article. Too bad he doesn't pay authors. Just gives them a free issue of the magazine they are published in."

Lily stopped where she was. "You wrote an article against the Ministry, and it got published?"

"More a recent practice that the Ministry instituted, not the Ministry itself. I'm sure at some point they would have come to their senses and backtracked and covered up, but I'm just suggesting some common sense be used ahead of time."

"Your common sense is not the same as other people's common sense, Sev."

"Because I think?"

"Very funny. Let's go in and then you can show me."

"It was actually the Ministry that made it a bit more sensational," Severus said as they went to their table. There were a couple students already in the classroom, looking over notes and equipment out. "To show the impact of Magical Law Enforcement and Aurors now allowed to use the Unforgivable curses, Lovegood went and asked for the statistics of how many times they were cast by Ministry officials. They wouldn't tell him.

"When Barty wrote his father, to just inquire if they were even tallied or just part of the case records, he got a scathing reply. It seems he thinks only uh … 'dissidents, malcontents and freethinkers' would ask such questions."

Lily made a face. Severus had this all mixed up. Of course the Ministry would know who cast what. They were called Unforgivables for a reason, and if they cast them, they would still need to answer or at least file some sort of report. If she knew who Lovegood was when he came asking questions, she'd probably tell him to go … jump in a lake. He's a crackpot, and if Severus kept associating with him, he'd be labeled a crackpot too.

Severus took out the copy of The Quibbler and slid it over to her. Lily's mouth dropped open. It was the cover story! And the cover illustration, well it looked pretty damning. Of course, Lily recognized the inspiration behind it … a smiling, good-looking, dark-haired wizard holding his wand with a green light shooting out of it at a young robed boy who was holding his mother's hand, had a little caption next to his head that said 'whoops!'. Behind the boy and his mother, there was a sinister looking cloaked figure who appeared to be getting away. In bold lettering on the bottom of the cover, the question was asked - 'Unforgivable for Ministry of Magic to state not accountable for Unforgivables?' Afraid to look, Lily flipped it open anyway to the table of contents, and there was Severus' name.

Staying calm because there was nothing that could be done now that Severus' views were in print, Lily asked, "May I borrow this to read later?"

"If you want."

Lily slid the magazine into her bag. She did not want to be caught reading The Quibbler. While she set up her equipment, Lily consoled herself because until she found that issue in the hospital, she had never seen that magazine. No one read it. No one would take it seriously. If they did, and found out that Severus was still a student, they'd realize it was a joke. It wasn't to Severus, but didn't Hogwart's students spend all their time pulling pranks?

Maybe Severus would never do anything like this again if no one made a big deal out of it. Lily did not want to see him disappointed, but she did not want him to get noticed for being some kind of … hippie anarchist. Her father hated hippies with their free love and power to the people rhetoric. Without government to run everything for them, they'd be stuck wherever they came from waiting for a train.

When Lily got to it later that morning in the privacy of her dorm room, Severus had written about the ideas he had over the summer about lack of control, oversight and accountability. Even though she knew Severus had written this, Lily noticed that his usual sarcasm was missing from the article. He even put his abrasive attitude into homework essays. Maybe that's why only that barmy arithmancy bloke liked him.

Lily had only left the room for a couple minutes, and returned to find Mary reading Sev's magazine.

"That's not something you'd be interested in."

"I thought it was Witch Weekly. Doesn't seem like you're taking our advice, Lily, or Severus would lighten up."

She sighed. Why did they think Lily doing things with Severus would change the way he acted towards others. "It's not Witch Weekly."

"I can see that. You never told me that Severus writes."

"He doesn't really. That's um … just … something he had on his mind."

"I think he should write more. Give someone other than you a view into that inscrutability."

"Severus worries too much."

"He should be. Did you hear Pettigrew?"

"I try not to."

"He was shooting his mouth off how him and his mates are going to be aurors and get even with all of us."

"Aren't they going to play quidditch?" Lily asked. She heard something like that in all of Potter's ramblings about whatever.

"Pro players all have that expensive Nimbus broom. Potter won't be anything special."

"They can't be aurors. That's a real job. Aren't their parents rich?"

"I know Black's and Potter's are. Yeah, none of them are the working type. The Ministry does not go for their employees lounging around snacking and telling stories all day. That's for the Minister only."

"And wasn't there a couple years of training in that pamphlet?"

"Probably. I don't remember, except it was too many hard NEWTs. I'm not going to kill myself with that kind of course load when all I want to do is get married. I have to be somewhat smart, but Malcolm's arithmancy is some sort torture that goblins must have thought up. They are frightfully clever with math."

"Goblins do arithmancy?"

"No, but they can count really high and know how things like percents and fractions work."

Severus' disdain for how ill-informed wizardkind was must be rubbing off on her. Count really high, indeed. With Helen wanting to play professional quidditch, and Mary's lifelong dream being just a wife, Lily was not inspired by her roommates' goals, but everyone was entitled to have one. Her own mother was a homemaker, and never once admitted any regrets that she may have done something else. Petunia worked a little for more pocket money, but that was to dress smart to attract a good husband. If Lily was not a witch, maybe she'd be thinking of that. Though, she'd probably do something outside the house. She did not like how dependent her mother was on her father. Lily's father always took care of things, but if a woman made a poor choice or something happened to the man of the house, then where would she be?

Was that why she was resisting Severus? He was not lazy, but did he even have any clue on what he was expected to do? His father was no example … maybe not, his mother didn't do anything, so Lily guessed his father did something. Severus couldn't help that his parents were such a mess. Could they even be considered worse than parents that spoiled their brats, and then bribed people when they ran wild and destroyed property and hurt others? Lily wouldn't want to marry someone like that.

Lily was worried. Mary was thoroughly reading Severus' article. Even if Pettigrew made some wild claims, there was no way people like the Marauders worked for the Ministry. Their parents couldn't buy them jobs, could they? It would be simpler to buy them someplace to live to get them out of the house. Oh gosh, living with the Marauders? She heard it took a small army of house elves to clean their common room after one of their celebrations. How many did they need to keep their homes clean? Lily would go crazy if she had to do that. Clean all night to have some toerag roll out of bed in the morning and then start all over with having to make the bed, pick up his laundry, clean up the bathroom after they mess that, and then probably have to make them breakfast for them just to throw it around … it would never end and probably not even earn one 'thanks'.

"Severus is onto something with this. We have rights too."

"It's probably more controlled than he makes it sound."

"Why won't they tell us then? And why would they cast _cruciatus_ on anyone? Or are they going to _imperius _someone during a big duel only? It's also not clear who they are allowed to cast the killing curse on. If there's some trouble in Diagon Alley while I'm busy shopping, and they put one of those anti-apparition jinxes on the whole place, I'll be the only one not allowed to use it to defend myself. It reminds me of Muggle Studies where we learned how the Americans all carry guns so they can take the law into their own hands, and they challenge each other to gunfight duels that occur right in the middle of their streets."

Lily didn't know why wizard and witches chose to show off how much they knew about muggles by giving their interpretations of what was happening to a muggleborn. They always ended up looking foolish. It was a blessing in disguise that they couldn't watch telly in Muggle Studies. They'd probably think that muggles spoke like a Shakespeare play, and then raced around in their automobiles squealing to a sudden stop, jumping out and sliding over the bonnet to shoot each other from some cop show. Helen and Mary would probably be able to follow a drama. Lily's mum was a loyal Corrie fan since it first started in 1960. Although raised with it, Lily felt it was a little simplistic because she could miss months of episodes while at Hogwart's, and be caught up almost immediately with a quick rundown from her mum.

"It sounds worse like that than it really is."

"No, Lily. There's no reason to some of things that Death Eater lot is doing. Just because we're at Hogwart's doesn't mean it isn't happening out there. Why do you think Dumbledore's always flitting off? He beat that Grindylow way back and now he wants to relive his glory days."

"Grindelwald," Lily corrected.

"Well, if he spends too much time away from here, and they can figure out when he's gone, I think we could be in danger here at the school."

Lily shook her head. The Daily Prophet not reporting everything or leaving some things vague were leading to outlandish rumors about masked men, glowing skulls, snakes and armies of inferi and werewolves. If they were all true, there'd be no wizards left alive in England but them.

Seeing Mary roll up the magazine, Lily said, "That's uh, Severus' copy."

"I'll give it back to him later in the library, Lily."

"What are you going to do with it?" Lily's hope that there were only two copies of the issue – one for Lovegood and one for Severus – wouldn't do much good if Mary went waving that one all over.

"You don't want Helen to see it?"

"She might not be interested. It's not quidditch."

"Lily, you should try to be more supportive. How many times have you told us that Severus is smart, and thinks about more than just the next insult he's going to cut someone down with?"

"He might not want to share it."

"Why would he send it to a magazine for publication, if he didn't want it read? Or use some other name?"

"Not many people read that magazine so they uh … might make fun of him."

"Since when does people mocking Snape matter to him? I think he does it on purpose, just to show others for the shallow idiots they are."

Lily opened her mouth, but stopped herself from asking Mary if she wasn't one of those idiots two days ago when she got mouthy about the state of Sev's textbooks. She was getting riled because when her friends became positive about Severus, they went overboard. It would probably be over by this evening when Severus told them all to sod off.

However, Severus did not get all pissy in the library when Mary turned up with the magazine. When they became too much for him, he left. Severus must have been planning his escape because when Lily left the table for less than a minute to get a book, she returned to find him and all his things gone.

"What happened?" she asked.

"Snape was done," Evan replied.

"No, he wasn't," Lily argued.

"Well that's what he said," Helen replied.

"Where did he go?"

"He didn't say," Helen said with growing irritation. She knew that Lily and Severus weren't seeing eye to eye on some issue, but Lily should just make up with him already. Helen didn't need to know Severus well to tell that he was the moody sort that could stay miserable for however long it took. It was surprising they could even be friends with Lily's stubbornness. Although Lily was a real catch for someone like Snape, she shouldn't make him come crawling back asking for forgiveness whenever she didn't like something. One day he might decide to cut his losses. It must be the red hair. All gingers were hot-headed. When combined with Lily's difficult streak because she couldn't admit whenever she was wrong, she could be unbearable.

Lily huffed as she sat down to continue working on her homework. If Severus returned to the Slytherin dorms, she wouldn't be able to follow, and would look like a fool hanging out in the dungeons.

By the next afternoon, Lily should not have worried about looking like a fool. Copies of The Quibbler were in the school. Not just the one copy that Severus had. With all this He Who Must Not Be Named and his Death Eater cronies, was it driving people mad for misinformation so much that they'd read The Quibbler?

Severus and her were sitting outside having lunch before Herbology, even though it was now November and getting too chilly for sitting on the ground, even in the sun. Lily tried to get her cloak around Severus too, but he protested, "Give me a moment to finish eating this first." Severus took two bites out of his apple, and then threw it into the woods. "What did you have in mind with your cloak, Lily?"

"I have to eat more than that, Sev."

"I'm not stopping you. Keep your cloak. I'll be fine."

Lily gave him a little push and said, "Lay down. I'll put it over the top of us."

He did as she asked, but when she lay down next to him, Lily decided she did not want to eat laying down so got back up, nudged Severus to turn onto his back as he was originally, and then knelt on top of him. When she started to get her cloak to cover him more, Severus said, "Higher," and indicated with a pull on her knees so she slid up to his waist. Lily spent almost a full minute arranging her cloak and folding some of his cloak off the ground and onto him.

"Next week, I'll put something else in my bag to lay on the ground," Severus suggested. He'd also refresh his memory on cushioning charms. Usually it wouldn't bother him, but with Lily on top of him, the hard, uneven ground was uncomfortable.

"Maybe if we have a night with little homework, we could come out for a walk before curfew. It's a full moon next week. That'd be nice, and it's getting cold enough that a lot of students are staying in. By the way, why did you leave so suddenly last night, Sev?"

"They weren't interested in doing homework. I have too much to do to let them sidetrack me."

"But Helen and Mary were agreeing with your point of view."

"They change their opinions day to day. Besides, you'd be even more angry at me, if they didn't shut up."

"Why would I be angry at you?"

"You don't agree with me. If others do not take your side, Lily, you get angry."

"I'd have to let them know my opinion first to expect them to agree with me."

"How long would you spend telling them the right opinion?"

"As long as it took for them to realize that you are being paranoid."

"In order to not waste time defending myself when I had a lot of homework, I left so you'd have their ears all to yourself, Lily."

"That's not fair. You can express yourself."

"I did, by writing it down."

"And I think out of our friends, they'd give you a decent chance to say something without dismissing your point of view."

"Friends?" Severus asked. "How about for now I call them acquaintances?"

"Severus, you room with two of them. How could they not be your friends?"

"Why would you call any Slytherin that sleeps in the same room as me my friend? If Sirius Black was sorted into my house like the rest of his whole family, would that make him my friend?"

"No. I know Sirius Black would never be your friend, and neither would Mulciber and Avery."

"Wilkes and Rosier know I'm not pureblood. I'm only included because of you. It's not going to last either."

"Why do you say it's not going to last? Is there a problem?"

"Not a problem. Their families are already negotiating, and then there's the question of marrying this summer or not. Depends if the married student quarters are archaic."

"What married students' quarters?"

"It's in Hogwart's, a History, Lily. I thought you read that?"

"There's a lot in that book, Sev. Why would students be married? They're students," Lily explained.

"It would be convenient. If they are going to have a formal betrothal, like their families normally do, the school doesn't give them any special privileges. With the different houses, neither of us can just pop round to see the other. How would it look if I was hanging outside Gryffindor tower? Would any of them even let you know I was waiting outside?"

"Don't be ridiculous. You can't wait outside our tower for me."

Severus shrugged one shoulder and said, "So, either the negotiations will go well, or it'll be off. That's what is going to happen first. Rosier and Wilkes also want to join us in Herbology. It will let those other girls subtly know they currently don't have a chance at them."

"What about Lupin?"

"He can buddy up to the girls. It doesn't matter that I ignore him. He won't stop talking. He can keep talking over at another table."

"I suppose. Why would Hogwart's have quarters for married students?" Lily asked, still confused. She'd have to look that up since Severus told her which book.

"Maybe back when witches were married young to old men by their families. The old goats could visit them to claim their rights if the girls were kept separate. Would also keep the married women from giving the unmarried ones ideas."

"Ideas, Sev? You're the one with quite an imagination."

"About what in particular?" he asked. Did Lily mean he thought about sex too much? How could that be his fault? It was Lily's. Maybe Mulciber's, but he tried to ignore whatever was going on over there.

"Anything. You think people are going to attack you for no reason, the government and school are full of incompetents, and you basically trust no one."

"I trust you with some things, Lily."

"Some things?"

"Do you want me to lie to you?"

Lily frowned at Severus. "I thought I was your best friend, Sev."

"You are, Lily. Do you trust me with everything?"

Annoyed, Lily said, "That's not the point. I mean you're … a boy."

Severus replied by quirking his eyebrow at her. What did he mean by that? He may be smarter at school stuff, but Lily definitely knew a lot more than him about life and how other people lived. Without her, where would he be for any company? Lily supposed if he didn't have her, Severus would have made more of effort to pal around with the Slytherin blokes. He definitely had the potential to overcome that half-blood nonsense. Lily had overcome whatever slight prejudice there was against muggleborns.

"Oh, Herbology," Lily said, reminded that they had a class to because she could see some students heading into the greenhouse.

Lily stopped when she reached the greenhouse door. There was a bunch of people at their table. Lupin, Wilkes, Rosier, a Hufflepuff boy and two Ravenclaws. Over at Wilkes and Rosier's old table, were two indignant Hufflepuff girls waiting with their hands on their hips.

Behind her, Severus muttered, "Better get it sorted before Prof. Sprout says something."

"She's nice, Sev."

"I don't want to put that to the test, Lily."

Although he already knew the extra three students were here to share a table with Snape due to that magazine, Wilkes knew who was boss and said, "Alright, Evans."

"Yes," Lily replied. "There's only room for four at a table, and there's eight of us, besides two young ladies over there. So maybe we should sort this before Prof. Sprout does it for us."

Remus had just gotten here before Evans and Snape, but he did know one thing. "I've been at this table for weeks."

The Hufflepuff boy suggested, "Well that settles it. We just wanted one class with Snape. Wilkes and Rosier have him all the time."

Severus was not agreeing, but moved backwards when the fellow tried to grab his arm. Touchy-feely Hufflepuff better cut it out, or he'd be off to the Infirmary to get that hand sorted.

Rosier laughed at Snape getting corralled by the Ravenclaws moving in thinking he was agreeing to go to the next table.

Wilkes agreed, "Too funny."

"But he doesn't ..."

"Don't worry. It's just one class, Evans," Wilkes said.

By the end of class, Wilkes and Rosier never wanted to be alone with Evans again without Snape around to be her slave. They were able to insist that Lupin be her servant, or partner, when she started being a bossy swot to all three of them. She probably wore Snape out so much with her demands that that's why he was such a peevish churl to the rest of them.

Lily spent the class watching and listening for anything wrong at Severus' table. The other three lads wanted to talk to him about his thoughts on the Ministry using the Unforgivables, once class was working on their projects. They ended up talking to each other, since Severus was not talkative, not even to insult them. Perhaps Severus was right. He wrote his opinion, and left it for others to discuss.

**************************

That evening, Severus left the library again to avoid others. Lily did not think many agreed with Severus, but were merely curious. Getting something published, in The Quiddler of all places, was not an open invitation for harassment. She doubted many even read the article from the way they tried to introduce themselves to her friend with what they considered clever openings.

This time though Severus made it a point to tell Lily he was going to the dungeons to continue with his homework.

**************************

Remus was up in their room trying to get a handle on his homework for Ancient Runes before they went to detention. If there was one class he should not let his attention get diverted, it was in there. The others were not listening to him about their grand plan for him to befriend their Slytherin enemy. Rather than admit it was a bad idea, they were listening to Peter when he suggested that Remus sit with him in other classes too, like Defense and Charms. After the full moon next week, they were all set to 'cast him out' publicly. Remus was totally against this new phase of the plan. Why would he want to appear friendless everywhere in the school outside of this room?

Besides, Snape did not appear to be looking for friends. Evans was not in Ancient Runes, and until Remus started sitting next to him, he seemed content to stay in the back of the room alone. He had told Remus that pretty much every time he sat down next to him so it wasn't his imagination. Remus just smiled at Snape no matter what he said. It there was a market for books of insults, Snape could become wealthy in no time.

Sometimes Ravenclaws would talk to Snape. Unless Remus was more lost in Runes than he thought, he overheard what he thought was Arithmancy. Ugh. Without help, Runes might as well be Arithmancy. He was going to miss another class again next week. That was the most powerful motivator to kiss up to Snape. He needed a friend that took school seriously. Remus' parents were happy with his OWLs, and he wanted to make them proud with his NEWTs too. He may not have any goals past Hogwart's, but with his condition he had to admit he was one of the lucky ones. Remus was willing to take things one step at a time.

The door banged open and Peter entered, claiming, "There he is. Why didn't you tell us your boyfriend was writing pro-death eater things?"

This constant detention was getting to Peter. If Remus didn't know better, Peter was getting hostile towards him. That was ridiculous because Remus hadn't done anything to Evans or Snape or anyone for that matter to land them in this mess. Frowning at whatever nonsense Peter overheard now, Remus replied, "I think I've already said that Snape does not talk to me, other than to tell me to go away."

"I still think you should grab his bum," James joked.

"Prongs! Remus is doing a good job. We don't need him to make the ultimate sacrifice," Sirius said in disgust. Sirius wouldn't so much as touch a quill after it had been in Snivelly's hands. Touch his person? Did Mrs. Scower have enough power to tackle that sort of grease?

What was Sirius talking about? Peter thought. Remus doing a good job? If he was given the job of kissing up to Snape, he'd have the slimy git giggling in his ear by now. "Lucky for us, I was able to nick a copy of it in the ladies'."

James and Remus showed their disapproval. It was one thing to rat around in the gents' listening, but a gentleman did not lurk in the girls' bathrooms.

Sirius didn't give that moral implication any thought at the moment because he was waving The Quibbler. "He wrote that the Ministry shouldn't be allowed to fight back against Death Eaters till they got a trial."

"Can I see it?" Remus asked. It sounded a little odd that someone would come right out and say something as simplistic as Death Eaters are people too, and they deserved the same rights.

Sirius threw it over, but it fluttered and fell short so Remus got up to fetch it. The cover did not shout 'Save the Poor Death Eaters'. It illustrated that people could be in between the Ministry and the Death Eater. Remus ignored, or the best he could ignore, his friends who were trying to help him read between the lines because there was no mention of Death Eaters and He Who Must Not Be Named anywhere in this article.

Finishing reading the article before he was forced to slap them all quiet, Remus clarified what he thought he read. "So … if you become aurors, when would it be alright to cast a _cruciatus _curse on someone?"

"Whenever we think they are withholding information," Sirius said.

"Well, it would have to be really important information, and we'd have to think they knew," James clarified.

"Obviously," Remus agreed. He knew not to take Sirius' impulsiveness at face value. "And it would be alright to put Padfoot under _imperius _to have him reconcile with his parents and either spy on his family, or if he found nothing, join the death eaters?"

"Simpler to do it to Regulisp," Sirius laughed. "He's the good boy."

"I'd never believe it of Padfoot," James said, joining his friend in a good laugh.

As one of the gang, Peter merrily agreed, "Padfoot? Why not Prongs and I too? Death Eaters. No way."

Remus closed his eyes. Sirius had answered the question, even if he didn't know it. It would be perfectly alright with him if someone cast an Unforgivable on his younger brother. Although Sirius was the only one of them that had a sibling, and reminded them frequently how fortunate they were not to have a little nightmare tagging around after them for years, if Remus had a brother or sister, he couldn't imagine joking that they would be a perfect candidate for an Unforgivable curse.

**************************

Lily also had closed her eyes in the girls' dormitory. Severus was not making up stories. Not that she thought he'd lie about something like this, but just got it as mixed up as everything else going on around him. Mary and Helen were interested in marriage. Helen's explanation regarding taking brooms for a test drive was uncalled for, but gave Lily a better perspective on why her friends thought that they should not wait till marriage to do that with their husbands, or perspective husbands.

She was fortuitous that Severus knew Lily so well that he recognized the mead had made her drunk and temporarily insane at the Hog's Head. Over time, she had also considered the way he had explained that he considered Lily too extraordinary to shag on a table at a filthy pub in front of others. Normally Lily got mad at her friend when he was right, but she'd forgive him this time.

Earlier in the library she found the one brief mention that married students quarters were separate from staff and married staff. Now that was interesting. Who on the staff was married? Besides Mrs. Norris.

Other than her friends pointing out that naturally staff could marry without saying who was married. They said that if not, there would be no Sirius Black. It seemed he had some relative that was Headmaster here in the early part of the century, and Sirius was a child of his child, or some such thing. Why does anyone care? Is it just a reason to act like a total toerag? Black's grampa was headmaster here?

They waved off the possibility that married students were ancient history, and there was no allowance made for them in modern times. They were more concerned with some demands about marriage negotiations. The funniest one was Mary wanted the Wilkes to provide at least one house elf for her new home. If Mary was not working outside the house and could use magic, why couldn't she keep up while Malcolm was at work? Once Lily was seventeen, she believed housework should become easier with magic. No more polishing silver or the copper bottoms of pans, scouring the sink, floors could be washed and dried, and there was probably lots of faster ways to make beds, clean carpets, maybe even clean the drapes without taking them down, and then having to iron them all before putting them back up.

Although Lily was interested in knowing what was going on, her girlfriends couldn't help turning the conversation back to her and Severus. They were brutal with their assessment that Severus would bring nothing to a marriage except his future potential. There was no money, property or even an employment prospect since he had no connections. The surprisingly new thought they expressed was that was alright for Severus since he didn't have any sort of expectations. He would be happy with anything, and then start from there. It was Lily that was the problem. She'd need a certain minimum allowance for clothes and she had personal goals that Severus would not be able to aid her with, such as obtaining a healer apprenticeship for her. If Lily would not settle for Severus, it would be better for her to distance herself now, as they've told her so many times, and set herself up for a wealthy lad or a pureblood who's family could help her.

Lily tried to express her indignation that she could do very well on her own merits. She didn't need some pedigreed nitwit to aid her, and Lily could do just fine without all the clothes and shoes and whatever else her girlfriends filled their room with. Their trunks were magically enhanced to contain more than a metric ton of stuff, or what they called 'necessities'.

She spent the rest of the night tutting and tsk'ing to herself with intermittent huffs. Lily Evans had no problems. It was Severus, and they were best friends. Not boyfriend and girlfriend getting swept up with this betrothal nonsense. They were sixteen, and only turning seventeen in January. No need for them to think that these four shagging idiots had a bright idea to save themselves the hassle of finding a spot to do all the out of bound things they got up to, and which were out of bounds to protect them from this sort of distracting nonsense.

**************************

Albus Dumbledore thought he was spending a quiet Saturday afternoon in his office, when his floo flared green.

"Ah, Dumbledore, good you're there."

"Barty," Albus responded. "How can I help you?""

"Do you have a moment for me to come through?"

"Absolutely, old friend," Albus replied with a wave of his hand to allow Crouch to floo into his office.

Bartemius Crouch, Sr. emerged from Dumbledore's fireplace without a hair out of place or a speck of soot upon him.

Albus came out from behind his desk and indicated a chair for his guest while asking, "Tea, Barty?"

"Don't have a lot of time, Dumbledore," he replied while taking a seat.

Sitting in the facing chair, Albus inquired, "Working on a Saturday?"

Crouch spread his hands wide to indicate the headmaster's office, "Aren't we all, Dumbledore? Aren't we all in these times?"

"So what can I do for you?"

"I was wondering if I could check some rumors with you. Riddle was a student here. Slytherin, class of 1945."

"Yes, he was."

He made a nervous gesture with his fingers before he continued, "Could his father have been a muggle, and his mother a squib?"

"Is that important?"

"His motivation, Dumbledore. If he is preaching to his followers about pureblood superiority, that would change everything."

"If he was pretending, I don't think it would make a difference. His followers are so drawn in by his charisma that the truth would not matter to them."

"Why pretend though?"

Albus shrugged, "Why shouldn't he? If there was a group he admired, it would not be beyond Riddle to feign he's one of them. He certainly wouldn't hesitate to steal something he coveted, why not a lifestyle?"

"Ah, but if he was pretending to lure them in instead?"

"To what purpose?"

"I don't need to tell you, Dumbledore, that things are not going well for his group of Death Eaters. None of them can openly claim support for him. They may have what they consider minor victories when they commit some terrible act, but society at large is against them. With the new measures I've instituted, and with the continued support of wizarding Britain, it shouldn't be long now."

"So they will lose then."

"But what if that's his goal? To draw out the type of wizard he most hated by pretending to be one of them and set himself up as their leader? We've caught some, but they haven't a clue who most of the other followers are. The only one who may know is Riddle himself. No one of his followers is as powerful as him. If he escapes, and some of his followers do as well, he can take his time hunting them down himself, or by supplying evidence to the Ministry of the acts they committed."

Albus stroked his chin in thought, and murmured, "Interesting." Sometimes it took a Slytherin to perceive the convoluted plans of another. Crouch was disciplined but also ruthless himself. That was the key to his popularity among the public as head of Magical Law Enforcement. He wouldn't let innocents be murdered in their beds without a fight. Even if he had to personally crush every Death Eater that was uncovered.

He added, "It sounds rather convoluted, Barty, but it would have to be to draw in others and get them to confess how they truly felt. I'll give it some thought." Albus would be up late tonight discussing this with his office full of advisors.

"Of course. It does sound rather incredible, but what else could there be? The fellow's a blood-thirsty lunatic. There may be no reason ever uncovered … or at least one that's believable."

"While you're here, Barty, would you like to visit with your son?"

"I really have to get back to the office, Dumbledore," Crouch replied while rising to go. He stopped on his way to the fireplace. "By the way, Dumbledore, that whole business about student welfare. I've closed it. Now that we have the true measure of that Snape lad, we know why you can't spare the rod on that one."

Albus blinked in surprise, was he being encouraged to use physical discipline? "True measure?"

"One of those impertinent troublemakers always questioning authority. No business talking when he has no clue. A Hogwart's student questioning me? If you want to get him up here, Dumbledore, I'd be able to spare a moment for adding my stripes to that ungrateful behind."

"Mr. Snape questioned you?" As far as Dumbledore knew, Crouch did not personally handle every case, but he was overly involved with his department. That's why he was so busy, with no time for anything else.

"Not directly. Irreverent coward wouldn't dare. No, no … that burdensome publication is now printing tripe from students. Although that Lovegood doesn't let the readers know it's from a child. Presents it like the article is from a concerned wizard."

"Ah," Albus said, understanding where troublemakers were allowed to question the Ministry. Albus had had a subscription to The Quibbler. It sometimes contained some real gems, and now a student had an article published? It must be something to get Barty's attention. "I suppose I better check up on that then, Barty."

"Knew you would, Dumbledore. Can't have these subversive elements at work when the government has work to do."

After Crouch flooed back to the Ministry, Albus returned to his desk while the portraits stirred offering their advice on what they thought of Barty's theory regarding Riddle. There was a copy in here somewhere, he thought while shifting aside his correspondence and a couple Witch Weeklies that contained recipes he'd like the house elves to try. Yes, here it was. The Quiddler. Maybe that would answer something.

**************************

Except for a couple forays outside the dungeons to trade library books and to get his own provisions from the kitchen, Severus had been avoiding the rest of the students. Slytherins could at least behave themselves, except maybe Crouch Jr. Severus didn't know what was so funny, but he was breaking out in giggles every time their paths crossed. He was actually quite bright so it seemed rather wasteful to see him frittering it away on some jokes, pranks or whatever he had percolating in his skull.

He had returned to their bedroom when the others went to dinner on Saturday night. Severus would rather be in the bedroom the whole time, but if he stayed in there too long, Mulciber and Avery would get angry because they could no longer wank loudly around him. To keep the truce tolerable for both sides, he was mostly sitting in the corner of the common room where the younger boys had their study group. Even though Severus no longer needed to wash the old potion off his skin and scalp in the morning, he maintained their deal to aid them with difficult homework for their lookout services. They switched off so it wasn't as if Severus was overburdening them.

After spending about an hour laying on his bed, staring up at the overhead canopy and thinking, he cut up some fruit and cooked a jacket potato with his wand. Severus was happily minding his own business and dining on his self-prepared feast in blessed solitude, when some grouch opened the bedroom door so hard it slammed into the stone wall.

Severus was disappointed that the door did not bounce off the wall and swing back just as hard into Slughorn, who was standing in the doorway pointing at him, and accused, "You!"

What could Severus say in response? He didn't know what it was now he supposedly did, but it wouldn't matter. He decided to annoy Slughorn by saying nothing, and had the nerve to smirk when the door finally did slowly swing back ruining whatever presence Slughorn thought he had.

Pushing the door open, Slughorn resumed pointing and said, "You are to be in the Headmaster's office at three tomorrow afternoon."

"Alright."

Slughorn scowled. Dumbledore invited him and Snape to tea tomorrow afternoon. Why? He was sure he had covered his tracks in the little mishap with that note. Silly of Pomfrey to have held on to it. She was also able to extricate herself from whatever this piece of dirt turned the Ministry on to. Dumbledore should just leave it alone. However, he did know one thing for sure, Snape's attitude would rid Dumbledore of any good will he may have dreamed up on this turd's behalf.

**************************

That evening, Wilkes and Rosier confirmed for Lily in the library that Severus was hiding in the dungeons, but was well the last time they saw him.

She was not amused when the four other people at the table exchanged glances. Severus spent five years of school avoiding people and hiding from others. Lily Evans hadn't missed her best friend before.

**************************

Severus was in the corridor next to the gargoyle that stood guard over the entrance to the Head's office at three o'clock, as requested. He waited for close to ten minutes, and began to wonder if Slughorn thought that this would be funny.

The gargoyle moved aside, and he heard Dumbledore call, "Severus, my boy, there you are. Come on up."

At the 'my boy', Severus curled his lip, rather than immediately going up the stairs. He had better things to do than play games with the lying old man. He put on a good show and said the right things like he was here for all the students and his door was always open for someone in need, however that was only true for some students. The Snapes were not wealthy or influential, or could even bother to write one letter of complaint so there were no doors open for Severus at Hogwart's, unless he was being led somewhere by a teacher to receive some punishment for daring to defend himself against his betters.

Deciding he might as well find out what he did this time, Severus ascended the stairs. Slughorn was already cozy in a comfy chair and enjoying some iced confection. A happy Slughorn meant Severus was in a great deal of trouble.

The headmaster joined his colleague at the table that was covered in more food than the two of them could possibly eat, unless Slughorn was planning on staying for another hour, Severus thought to himself sarcastically.

Once seated, Dumbledore asked, "Join us for tea?"

If truly given a choice than 'no', but since Severus was not really here for tea, he sat at the chair that was indicated to him by the headmaster's waving hand. Normally, Severus liked tea. Mrs. Evans and Petunia made wonderful food for tea. None of that kind of food was here. There were no little sandwiches, thinly sliced or bite-sized fruit, or even bits of cheese cut cleverly. It was all cookies, cakes and tarts either iced or with crystallized sugar topping artfully arranged on white flowered plates. The combined smell was nauseating. Severus was torn as to whether stay on the edge of the chintz armchair's deep seat, or sit back to get his nose away from their foul repast.

While Dumbledore was busy with the tea pot, Severus took that opportunity to dig his heels into the carpet and give the entire chair a good shove back from the table. While he watched the headmaster, it was almost painful to keep his eyebrows from shooting upwards as cube after cube of sugar was added to the cup. He was unable to stop the quick shudder when the cup was placed in front of him on the table. Doesn't the host ask how the guest likes their tea? Since he was adding a like number to his own cup, it was probably sugar. It was Severus' mistake thinking that Dumbledore would be a good enough actor to play a proper host for tea.

He waited for Dumbledore or Slughorn to get to why they wanted him here since Severus could see them stuff themselves with desserts any evening at dinner. After the obligatory weather talk between the two men, Slughorn bragged about his invitations from his famous correspondents.

Dumbledore interrupted Slughorn's tired monologue regarding how difficult it was to be in demand by so many important people, to ask, "And what about you, Severus?"

He had been paying attention to the conversation, waiting for the real reason he was here, but the insertion of this question among Slughorn's talk of self-importance made no sense. No one invited Severus Snape anywhere. He was quite the opposite. A man with no demands upon his time, other than school. He silently looked up from the table and at Dumbledore, waiting for some clarification. Maybe the headmaster forgot that Slughorn had been speaking, or like everyone else simply became tired of listening to him.

Albus tried to make use of this sudden eye contact, but Severus' mind was as calm as a pool of water. It revealed nothing, but that was frequently the case when legilimency was subtly used and the subject had nothing on his mind. Not what he expected. Snape struck him as someone who was constantly thinking.

Annoyed that his conversation was interrupted for Snape to be as sociable as a stone, Slughorn cleared his throat impatiently and then continued, relating some fascinating news he had received from one of his many protégées.

Disappointed that Severus went back to staring at the edge of the table, Albus was delighted to find that today's custard tarts were particularly fine. The house elves continually surprised him with making his treats so sensational.

After Dumbledore licked his fingers like a toddler, he picked up one of the tarts with those same saliva-covered fingers, and placed it in front of Severus, suggesting, "You really ought to try one of these." Severus glared at the pastry before turning his gaze on the headmaster. Why didn't Dumbledore chew it for him and then spit it in his mouth? He was revolting.

The vivid image that Albus got from Severus this time was quite disturbing. So much so, he no longer felt like eating. If Snape was angry at him, why would he be thinking about Albus doing such a degrading thing to him, rather than with Albus as the victim? It would have been one thing to imagine someone would cause him harm or shame, but the thought was so life-like and graphically repulsive.

Undeterred, Slughorn continued talking between bites of multiple tarts from the plate Dumbledore had suggested.

Somewhat recovered, although still puzzled about Snape's reluctance to enjoy any of this fine fare, Dumbledore interrupted Slughorn purposely, murmuring at the end of one of his fascinating bits of news, "Excellent, Horace, but you know that's not why I've invited the two of you to tea."

Horace gave a slight noise of agreement while sipping his tea and studying Snape. So far, he had held his tongue, and if he knew what was good for him, it would stay that way. At times, insignificant pupils thought they had the headmaster's ear and then proceeded to make fools of themselves prattling on about nonsense or to make ridiculous accusations about the staff or fellow students. Snape had his fun with the Ministry, and by now he should have realized that no matter how plausible his tale, no one would listen to him.

"I saw your article in The Quiddler, Severus."

When Snape said nothing, Albus tried to coax him by asking, "You did write it?"

"Yes."

"I found it insightful."

Horace was frowning. The magazine the headmaster mentioned was not worth reading, but now it was publishing the scribbles of a lackluster student like Snape? He hoped Albus didn't expect him to encourage Snape's dull attempt at recognition.

Severus continued to wait in silence for whatever punishment was about to be meted out. He was entitled to his own opinion, and if someone wanted to publish it, he saw nothing wrong with that. He was well aware of Lily's opinion that the Ministry could do no wrong was popular. Government existed to prevent the general populace from having worries by establishing laws and a bureaucracy to enforce the laws. However if the government no longer served the people, but instead endangered them, Severus could not be the only person that saw that as a problem. Especially when the government felt it was no longer answerable to the public.

Disheartened that this was turning into a conversation with himself, rather than something philosophical regarding the Ministry's rights as opposed to the rights of the everyday witch or wizard, Albus added, "A job well done, my boy."

When it was not followed by scheduling detention or a loss of points, Severus ventured, "I'm free to go?" If he wasn't, his impertinence was sure to get this meeting to the whole point why he was being put through this charade.

Albus refused to be pessimistic. Obviously something was amiss, and once he figured out what it was, he'd give this another try. Now that he read a glimmer of what Snape concealed, he unveiled a clue as to why others thought this boy was significant. Although now he was not sure who these others were. "Eager to get back to enjoying your weekend, Severus? Very well. I'll invite you up again sometime."

Severus gave the headmaster a challenging glare. Threatening him with another of these so-called invitations?

"Get a move on, Snape," Slughorn insisted. The sight of the lad was unappetizing, and there were a couple items that he had not sampled yet.

Once Severus silently left his office, Albus mentioned, "Some deep waters there, eh, Horace?"

"More like shallow and unappreciative."

Albus smirked at his friend. Horace was always a little put out when he didn't recognize everyone's potential in first year, especially one of his Slytherins. Snape didn't have his own charm, and his mother attended school with Tom Riddle. Who remembered any of the other Slytherins when Tom Riddle was a student?

**************************

After having his ears numbed by Slughorn, Severus decided to go to dinner in the Great Hall and join the others in the library, if Hufflepuffs learned to keep their hands to themselves.

The youngest Slytherins were especially chatty tonight. The cutest had recovered from being Gryffindor bait earlier in the day for disillusioned prefects. Apparently Godric's house had crept into positive territory, and had been keeping at least five rubies in their glass for a few days. Little Slytherins skipping rope in the Front Hall was just too much for them to resist. It was like a dog seeing a cat. What idiots, especially when they went to get their bullying buddies to assist and cheer them on. Can't be heroes unless their mates see twenty of them jinxing first and second years from the staircases above. Well, more Gryffindors meant more points subtracted, and their house was now at a new low. Unless they were too stupid to realize that negative numbers with more digits were lower. The brave lions were at negative 105 due to five points being subtracted for every Gryffindor that cast something.

Catsup puddings were back for afters. All the sugar in Hogwart's must have been devoured by Dumbledore and Slughorn this afternoon. Self-centered gluttons who thought themselves more deserving than others and wasted his time with their immature games. In a year and a half, Severus would no longer be at their beck and call for their self important shit. For now, they could force him to tea all they wanted, but there was no way he'd kiss their arses.

Wilkes and Rosier already knew his mood, and forewarned the ladies when the reached the library, "Go easy on him, he was trapped in room with old Sluggy and Dumbledore this afternoon."

"What for?" asked Lily.

Severus shrugged, "No reason other than they can order students around. It was almost an hour of listening to poor Slughorn tell his tale of how he's some sort of social butterfly flitting between all his friends."

Lily tsk'd and said, "Stop exaggerating, Severus. Who else was there?"

"Just the three of us. It was simply pathetic. He just kept shoving food into his face while blabbing about quidditch, the ministry, some spells mistress, some Bulgarians, someone in Tibet, and then some students that are in Australia now."

"What about you?"

"Me? What do I care about his nonstop speech of grandness? I wouldn't care if that windbag claimed that he got the Beatles together, and Lennon wrote 'I am the Walrus' as a tribute to him."

Lily laughed, "goo goo ja goob." Slughorn getting the Beatles together was totally outrageous, but if the professor knew how big they were, or even still are, in the muggle world, perhaps he wouldn't mind taking credit for them.

"Really. I didn't gain or lose points, or receive detention." Severus waved his hand in the air and claimed, "I just let the words wash over me."

"That's good, Sev," Lily commented. Severus needed to practice controlling his temper with those he considered to be idiots. Slughorn was high on his idiot list.

**************************

The Marauders were besides themselves at how moronic their housemates were. Slytherins skipping rope in the Front Hall? Never trust Slytherins. Now they were lower in points than ever. They wouldn't be out of detention by Christmas at this rate.

This totally sucked. Snape was running rings around them while they had to play with Filch every night. They weren't lucky enough to get some fresh air with Hagrid after the girls caught Pettigrew.

Remus was the only one of the four that tried to reason that maybe it wasn't one person that was the cause of their troubles. The younger Gryffindor boys that ganged up on the playing Slytherins hadn't seen Snape, they only saw a couple youngsters from their rival house, and then a lot of prefects. If they wouldn't hold their housemates responsible for their own actions, since they were inspired by the Marauders themselves, who could they really blame?

He hoped his friends would show some restraint this week while he was indisposed.

**************************

It was quiet in Ancient Runes and Herbology for Severus without Remus Lupin jawing at him. Lily had been told that he went home because his mother was sick. Not that he didn't enjoy Lupin being absent, but none of of the other students took as much time off as him.

The last class of the day had just let out and the halls were crowded. Even though he had not been openly attacked since he returned from St. Mungo's, Severus was being observant.

What happened just in front of him, didn't need someone being observant to notice. Some girl's skirt and robe flew up, just as it had to Lily earlier in the month. Severus didn't know her, but quickly cast _finite incantem._ That resulted in him getting hit with _expelliarmus_ which knocked him to the floor, followed by a _levicorpus_,while Pettigrew crowed, "Got ya now, Snivellus."

Severus struggled to get his robe off his face to see if it was all three of his enemies. He could hear girls screaming before he was dropped without warning onto the floor head first. Why did he always seem to land on his nose every time that spell was released?

In pain, Severus managed to get his robe off his head, stay on the floor and look for his wand while chaos reigned over the hallway. Other students were now fighting, and it would be dangerous to stand up or move suddenly. He tried to wandlessly _accio _his wand, but it did not show up. Severus had been practicing that one, but it did not work unless his hand was within a yard of it.

He had gotten over to the wall, either to find his wand kicked up against it, or to avoid other people either getting knocked back with spells, or levitated then dropped. Searching for his wand in a dark niche, Severus' hair was grabbed from behind and his head was pounded down into the floor face first before being jerked up so he could blink at Sirius Black.

"Caught you this time, Snivelly," Black said almost lovingly, with a wicked gleam in his eye.

Dazed but not defeated, Severus repeated, "This time?"

"Attacking girls, you slimy death eater," Sirius explained, while giving Snape a hard slap across the face.

Severus got his hands up and on the pretty boy's face going for his eyes, or failing that perhaps grabbing his hair in return for the grip Black had on his. "I didn't attack any …," he started to say, but Black jerked his head back and into the wall.

"I don't want to hear your lies, Snivellus. I got a month of detention to bash out of your greasy head."

Becoming more addled with agony as his head was knocked against the stone wall again, Severus got a weak hold on Black's hair. Physically fighting was not going to give him the upper hand. It was fortunate the crowd's chants of 'Snape, Snape, Snivellus' hadn't started, or Black would be beating his head in tempo with it. He tried to think. They were inside the school, and there was enough noise in this hallway to get someone's attention. Severus just needed to keep his skull intact till a staff member showed up. Perhaps if his new 'friend' Lupin were here, then … Severus would know his talking was all an act. Could he confuse Black about Lupin? If he got Black angry, he might just start ranting so hard that the beating would stop. "Lupin went home to get out of detention. Can't bear all the trouble you've gotten him into to."

Black barked out a laugh, "Lupin at home? For all your talk of brains, Snivelly, you can't find a bottle of shampoo in the bath. He's still here. He never leaves. You want to know where to find your friend, I'll tell you. Tonight, after curfew, go out to that Whomping Willow, at the base of it is a big knot, can't miss it, press it, and presto you can get into the secret passage. Your buddy's …"

"C'mon, Padfoot. I got your wand. We need to get out of here," Potter yelled.

"I'm coming!" Black yelled back. He gave Snape a couple pats to the cheek and murmured, "Say hello from me. Remus gets a little lonely and with detention, I can't sneak out myself." Black gave Snape's hair one more yank to hit him up against the wall again, and then left.

This was one of those times that Severus cursed his tolerance to pain that kept him from passing out. If only he had known people could do that when he was a young child, he may have figured out that skill. Some people were so delicate they could faint at the sight of blood. He hated head pain, not as much as burns, but his father and mother did not hit him in the head with significant force frequently enough to train him to ignore this kind of throbbing. He had his nose broken frequently since starting at Hogwart's so that was painful, but the kind he conditioned himself to just acknowledge and move onto sorting … if he had his wand and a mirror.

Severus tried to remain unnoticed where he was by sitting against the wall. It failed because that little smiling second year Slytherin leaned down in front of him, with those teeth. He had instinctively hated this boy from the first moment, probably because he was just so unnaturally good looking. That's probably why Severus thought everything he said was an absolute lie because he reminded him so strongly of Potter and Black. "I think I found your wand, Severus," the boy, was his name Flockheart?, while waving Severus' dark wand excitedly.

"Yeah, thanks," he muttered, holding out his hand. It was his, but he would have taken someone else's till his was found.

The enthusiastic lad gave him his wand, and commented, "You look a mess. I think I can ..."

Severus growled, "Get your wand out of my face, or you'll regret it."

"Uh, right. That was … uh, the way you held off Black from helping Pettigrew. If it were me, ..."

"I don't care," he insisted. Holding off Black by getting his skull smashed into a wall. What a dunderhead.

Severus looked around. The Gryffindors retreated due to superior opposition, rather than a teacher chasing them off. Whoever that girl was, she must have been popular.

A wave of self-pity hit Severus, he wanted Lily to fix his nose. He shook it off. He was more than capable to sort it himself, and there was a gent's down the hall. He felt dizzy as he got stood. There was blood on his shirt, sweater and tie, but he couldn't have lost that much from his nose. Damn Black. More for him to get sorted.

Left to himself, Severus was able to get his nose fixed and his clothes cleaned in the boys' bathroom. His head felt sore to the touch, but there was no bleeding or anything that felt like a large lump. He didn't need this, he had to finish up on an assignment due tomorrow.

By the time he returned to the dungeons, Severus decided that maybe he should lay down for a bit and skip dinner. He'd set an alarm charm to wake him so he could go up to the library in a little over an hour.

He was feeling better by the time he joined the others in the library.

"You were in the hall when Glenda Chittock got attacked, Sev?" Lily asked before his bum was even in the chair.

"Some Hufflepuff. Younger than us," Severus replied. He didn't care who she was.

"She's a sweet girl."

Severus stared at Lily. How did she remember all these names? If whoever she was was a sweet girl, why would a prefect need to know her name? That was for troublemakers. He looked away and took out his schoolwork.

"How are you, Severus?" Mary asked.

He barely spared a glance for MacDonald. She had on that Spinner End Harlot too bright a red lipstick again. Did she wear that because she knew Wilkes liked finding it on his body later? Severus had trouble understanding why someone would want to marry her. She didn't seem to have any ambition, except to shag. The more he got to know Parkin and MacDonald, his opinion of them continued to decline. Severus hadn't thought too much of them to begin with since they took Lily away from him. Like Petunia though, he had to be civil for Lily's sake because she liked them.

Ignoring that he had already begun working, Helen wouldn't let the subject drop and said, "Pettigrew said you were hurt."

He grunted, "Not if a member of staff doesn't see it."

"Sev," Lily admonished. "Where?"

"Fourth floor hall near the stairs."

"You know what I meant."

"Nose and head. I tricked Black into getting chatty. Merlin, how he loves the sound of his own voice."

Evan laughed, "Did he reveal all the Marauder plans?"

"Their plans? I doubt they think beyond their next meal," Severus muttered. "No, he was trying to tell me something about Lupin taking some secret passage under that bloody Whomping Willow, rather than spending so much time at home."

"No," Lily said. "He'd need his parents to take him out of school. He can't just go larking off through a secret passage." As far as Lily knew, Lupin was the marginally responsible Marauder.

"I don't know," Severus said. "That's what Black said. And if Black sends me howlers, can't they forge other notes?"

Lily frowned, "And Lupin came back in time to go to Hogsmeade when um ... his gran was supposed to be on her death bed."

Helen asked, "How much homework do you all have?"

"Why?" Evan asked.

"We could go for a walk before curfew to look," Helen explained.

"Near the Whomping Willow?" Malcolm asked.

"Malcolm … on a beautiful night with the full moon shining? Even if there's nothing there, it would be a lovely walk," Mary hinted.

Lily added, "A possible adventure. How about it?"

Evan was not convinced. "It'll be cold."

"I can think of some charming ways to keep you warm," Helen suggested.

After a look at Lily, Severus was to first boy to concede. "I haven't much that needs to be done in the library. Just that you know that this information came from Black, and Sirius Black is a liar."

"You don't have to tell us."

With possible adventure ahead of them, even if only the romantic kind, the six of them efficiently completed their work, and parted ways to fetch their cloaks and then meet up in the Front Hall.

Malcolm led them out the front door, warning the ladies, "Just remember if there's danger, us Slytherins will want to save our arses."

Evan suggested, "Maybe you can join us in retreat."

"It's only Black, and him and his those idiots are in detention right now," Helen said.

Mary scoffed, "Even if they set up some sort of booby trap, you couldn't outthink them?"

"They don't appreciate subtlety nor complexity," Severus clarified.

"We do," Lily replied.

They drifted apart into hand-holding pairs, all slowly strolling towards the Whomping Willow.

"It is nice out," Severus commented. The sky was picturesque with the full moon hanging low in the sky so the stars were not overwhelmed by its light. The air was crisp and perfect, without being too cold.

"What do you want to do after the Whomping Willow?" Lily asked.

"Walk around the lake?"

"That'd be nice. Are you sure you aren't hurt?"

"I laid down for a bit, and I'm feeling better."

"Hold up, we're getting ahead of the others," Lily mentioned. The other couples had stopped for snogging and groping.

"They know where we're going. Black mentioned a knot on the trunk that needed to be pressed."

"You think there is?"

"Black and Potter know so many ways out of the school, it could be a secret passage they don't use."

"If it's way over by the Whomping Willow, I guess so. There's plenty in the school. Do you know they broke into Honeydukes?"

"Broke in? Like they stole?"

"It was before I was a prefect so I don't know how they sorted it. Our common room was covered in the trash from it so that's how they got caught. They even left the crate from their basement where it could be found."

"Why do they mess up your common room? There's only four of them out of how many Gryffindors?"

"Over fifty. It changes year to year."

"I wonder what they do with years where a house only gets a couple students."

"What do you mean, Sev?"

"There's no guarantee that there will be about, I don't know, thirty students a year? And then they aren't just divided by four to get sorted evenly into the houses."

"Don't worry about it."

"I'm not worried about it. Just think it's interesting."

"You find too many things interesting, Sev."

"Just different things from you, Lily."

"What do you mean by that?" Lily asked defensively.

He shrugged, "You knew the name of that girl in the hall today. I just countered the jinx, and didn't give any thought to who she was."

"Why not?"

"Why should I be bothered? She can just go on her way, or if she knew who cast it, she was free of having her robe wrapped around her head to do something."

"But … what are you saying?"

"What would I say about some girl I don't know?"

"If you didn't care, than why did you bother helping her?"

"Because I don't like that spell."

"Oh," Lily replied. It was cast on her. Severus could just come right out and say that's why he helped Chittock. Rather than having her think that her friend was helping people because it was the right thing to do.

After walking in silence, Severus suggested, "We should have waited till Saturday when we could see."

Lily said, "I'm sure you can manage."

"We're being predictable coming tonight."

"Stop worrying. If there's trouble, there's six of us."

"Not if four of us are keeping each other warm."

"I'll keep you warm later on our walk around the lake, Sev."

"Hmm," was his only reply as he took out his wand. Severus nonverbally cast what Lily thought was

_lumos_, but then he shook his wand and the globe flew off the tip and expanded. He cast several of them to illuminate the whomping willow, with them concentrating on the lower trunk.

Lily did not see anything interesting, and didn't think Severus did because she heard him sigh as she followed him as he circled the tree from a safe distance.

He stopped and forcefully cast _i__mpedimenta. _The willow stopped moving. "Didn't know if it would work on a tree," Severus said as he stepped closer and cast _lumos solem _and aimed the warm light underneath into a gap in the roots, then onto the surrounding trunk. "That might be the knot, but are we expected to crawl in there? Maybe that's the joke."

Lily looked and did see the knot. She said, "Perhaps. Come back here, and we'll wait for the others." She didn't want to crawl under a tree, but if the others wanted to, she'd go along.

Severus did as she asked. Crawling under the whomping willow and getting filthy was not his idea of fun. Maybe the others would prefer casting warming charms and shagging in the moonlight, so Lily and him would be free to walk around the lake.

The whomping willow stirred before the other four students joined them.

"So what have you two found?" Evan Rosier asked.

"Maybe we found the knot. _I__mpedimenta _stops its motion so we can get in and press it. It may be the knot only stops it from moving too."

"What good would that be? It's on the tree," Mary pointed out.

"There's a gap in the roots that we can investigate for a secret passage. I didn't see another opening big enough for us," Severus continued.

"Let's get to it," suggested Malcolm.

Severus cast _i__mpedimenta _as hard as he could to try to keep the tree still longer in case they were delayed under it. He quickly followed it with more light, trying to light the entire bottom of the tree to allow the others to detect anything he may have missed.

Helen ran over to the same knot he had noticed and pressed it. When nothing happened, she circled the tree, adding more light of her own.

Mary was looking into the gap with Malcolm holding her hand and his own lit wand in his other hand.

More cautious than the others, Evan cast some detection charms in the area to determine if it was just the six of them here with the whomping willow.

Severus joined Mary and Malcolm, with Lily joining them also, and filled the gap with more globes of light to determine if the gap was just under the tree or went further. He needed to experiment a bit with his spell to have the spheres move untethered in a general direction. Till now, he had only cast them to fix upon things that were within his line of sight.

Helen finished her investigation and joined them, while Evan continued to guard their backs. It appeared that the lights were dropping down.

Malcolm suggested, "Lily's smallest."

"If it's just a hole in the ground, we're going to have to help her get back out," Severus commented while glaring at Wilkes.

"Could also be a bit of a drop," Mary said.

"I'll go," Lily said. "Severus can light the hole to see if we can see a bottom, and one of you other fellows can lower me down."

Keeping his grumbles to himself, Severus cast another _i__mpedimenta _at the whomping willow, not trusting the tale of the knot or his colleagues' ability to think. He then knelt down in the dirt, and ended up on his stomach to slide partially into the gap to see what was viewable.

"It could be a tunnel. It's just a bit of a downward slope, not a drop," he said, while he felt someone impatiently trying to crawl over him. From the weight, it had better be Lily, rather than one of the other girls.

When Lily's head was next to his, she whispered, "Isn't this exciting, Sev?" She looked at where she needed to go and exclaimed, "I'm going in."

He shielded his face when her feet went past, then followed her in. A second girl might not have enough muscle to pull or push Lily through a tight area or out of an unexpected drop.

Once they were on their feet, but stooped over in the space, Severus sent more light ahead. He called, "We should be able to climb back out without aid from outside. It's a tunnel, with a low ceiling. Not sure how far it goes."

Helen and Mary entered next, Malcolm followed, and when Evan came in, he asked, "Should I _nox_ everything behind us to cover our trail in case someone's following at a distance?"

Malcolm answered, "Do the ones outside for now."

Mary kidded, "For all we know, Black's sending us into a nest of acromantulas, and we'll have to make a run for it."

"They live in Borneo, not Scotland," Lily replied.

"It was a joke. Come on," Mary said, taking the lead.

Helen agreed, "Yeah, we don't have all night. Even with two prefects, we shouldn't miss curfew."

Malcolm checked his watch. "We have plenty of time."

Lily followed her girlfriends, and Severus grabbed her hand. He didn't want her rushing off after them. The fellows were taller and having a slower time negotiating the tunnel. Black wouldn't have given up this kind of information without some purpose.

He got his loose light globes to move faster for them. They could hear Mary and Helen conjecturing about where the tunnel led. If any of them had given thought to the idea that Black would really reveal one of the secret passages, they might have thought to bring a compass.

Severus had no idea. The whomping willow was near the forbidden forest and Hagrid's hut. The quidditch pitch was on the other side of the castle. When he first came into the tunnel, the direction was parallel to the forest in the direction of the gates. They seemed to be going straight, but since they were underground that feeling could be deceptive.

When they could no longer hear the girls ahead, Severus doubted they ran out of things to say. They probably were moving faster than him and Lily. Lily was pulling at him to go more quickly.

When the tunnel sloped upward and twisted a bit, Severus was concerned because he had not felt they had descended any further than that initial bit they slid down under the whomping willow. There was an opening, and he gave Lily a boost up after sending his globes which were gathered at the bottom upwards. He pulled himself up into a room after her.

Lily called for Mary and Helen, while standing near the opening looking around with Severus. The walls had peeling wallpaper but there were some Gryffindor banners up. The furniture had pieces thrown about the stained wooden floor, but what remained was covered with red throws. There was also red area rug in the center of the room. All the windows were boarded over, but there were a lot of unlit candles. Most had been knocked down to the floor.

"There's a case of butterbeer in the corner," she pointed out to Severus. She heard a creak from overhead as Malcolm and Evan joined them.

"Where are they?" Malcolm asked.

"I think upstairs," Lily answered.

Evan cast _homenum revelio_.

Following an exasperated indrawn breath, Severus cast _homenum revelio quantitas_. They knew Mary and Helen were here. The question was how many others were here in addition to those two. Aloud, Severus confirmed, "Only two, besides us."

"So what's this?" Malcolm asked. "Some Gryffindor shag shack?"

Evan contemplated, "Maybe they went upstairs to look for beds?"

"If they are anything like down here, I'd rather do it on my cloak outside," complained Malcolm.

Lily called up the stairs, "Mary, Helen, I'm coming up. If you don't want me to come up there, say something."

Severus looked up the dark stairs, and cast some more globes of light. He could extinguish them if the girls called down that Lily and him shouldn't come up. There was some kind of sound up there. It could be something sexual, but if the blokes were down here, maybe it wasn't.

Lily shrugged and started heading up.


	29. Chapter 29 Stars Extinguished

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

AN: I'm not sure if McGonagall knew Lupin was a werewolf. It may have been just Dumbledore and Pomfrey. I'm intentionally being vague to fit either interpretation.

Chapter 29 Stars Extinguished

During detention, they weren't allowed to talk, but they had worked out how to whisper right under Filch's ugly mug. Sirius surprised the others by saying that he had homework he needed to do, rather than spending their time running around with Moony.

"Homework?" hissed James. Sirius didn't care about homework.

"Padfoot!" Peter exclaimed, so excited he squeaked it out. Peter loved their moonlit excursions. If Sirius didn't go, maybe James wouldn't either. They had the same classes so would have the same homework.

"Move away from each other," Filch snarled, seeing that the three had scrubbed their way to the center of the room.

It was a while before they could rejoin each other, and be able to talk. During that time Sirius had reconsidered his little white lie. If they all stayed in, Sirius would have to pretend to do homework. Ugh.

"Moony can't leave the shack tonight," whispered Sirius.

"Why not?" asked James.

"Told Snivelly how to keep him company."

"That's not funny," James replied, thinking Sirius was joking.

Peter inquired, "What if he kills Moony?" The killing curse should work on werewolves, and Snape could cast it. It was just a question of who killed who first.

"He's a werewolf," Sirius snapped without thinking.

"What about Snape?" James reminded them. Remus getting killed was not the likely outcome of the meeting.

"What about him?" Peter whispered. They'd only be in trouble if he got out alive, and if he killed Remus, he'd be in more trouble than them. The best thing that could happen would be for Remus to kill and eat him. They should go out there to get rid of anything that was left over.

"He could end up dead or even turned into a werewolf," James explained.

"So what? Besides we won't be that lucky, he'll probably just run as soon as he sees Moony."

"Moony can run too, Padfoot."

Sirius looked at James like he was stupid. Since when did Prongs care about what happened to Snape? Without him and his schemes, things would go back to normal around here. They'd have him right where they wanted him, Snape would be out of bounds after curfew sneaking around, and then he wouldn't be able to tell anyone what he saw. It would figuratively eat him up alive.

Peter was also looking at James. Moony chasing Snape down would only be a problem if Snivellus could make it to the castle. Remus was very good at chasing down things in the forest so he saw no reason to get worried.

Having made up his mind, James said, "I got to stop him."

"You're going to tell Filch?" Peter asked with his voice breaking into the range that Filch could hear again.

"Separate corners," the caretaker spit out at these idiot students who could not follow instructions to scrub a floor if their lives depended on it.

James shook his head 'no' in answer to Peter's question. For all they knew, Snape had not listened to Sirius at all. As soon as they were allowed to go, he'd grab his invisibility cloak and sneak out to stop Snape at the whomping willow. That way he's never know Remus' secret.

*********************************

The stairs were noisy so Severus could no longer hear anything upstairs as Lily ascended with him closely behind her. Malcolm and Evan were following them up. They weren't going to stay, he thought, because it stank up here.

Severus had just reached the top, and moved to follow Lily through the doorway when something big in front of her grabbed her shoulders. He could see long, hairy grey fingers ending in black curved claws on the back of her shoulders clutch her, and heard Lily screaming as she was pulled into the room.

With a twitch of his wand, the light entered the room at the same time as him, and he cast _reducto _at the open-mouthed face that was about to bite Lily's.

Stupid, stupid, stupid, was all he could think about himself when he yelled, "Don't swallow." Against his better judgment, Severus got in front of Lily with his back to the wounded werewolf, and _accio_'d any bit of the werewolf off of her and out of her mouth that was open when he cast the blasting curse. It was still open, even though Lily had stopped screaming. Through the rips of her cloak, Severus could see the wounds in her shoulders.

"Move back," he instructed her, before turning to see how quickly the werewolf recovered. It healed too fast. He cast it less than a minute ago and it was almost fully recovered. Severus tried to shove it away with a spell first, but it barely moved so he hit it with another _reducto_ to the face, followed by brutal repetitions of the spell that reduced its consciousness enough for him to repulse it further away from him, Lily, and whichever of the girls this was on the floor next to him. He hadn't taken the time to look yet.

"Just kill it!" yelled Wilkes.

Severus frowned, not taking his eyes off the werewolf. He didn't mind casting menial spells to be helpful and to have a reason to be brought along, but direct commands is where he'd draw the line. If he cast the killing curse, he would be the one sent to Azkaban. That was the point in naming it an Unforgivable to make it clear there was no excuse good enough to cast it. Whoever this werewolf was, even if he was a muggle, there would be no way Severus would be able to convince anyone that his life was more important than his … or hers? He _reducto_'d some major bits that were starting to reform before replying, "We can't use Unforgivables on it."

The sound of someone crying got Severus to glance over to the other wall. Rosier was weeping over … hunks of meat that were laying on the floor. There was blood and flesh splattered on the wall above it. That was what Black had in mind for him, except there would be no one crying. He blinked trying to clear his head, he'd have plenty of time to consider intent once they were out of here.

"What should I cast?" Lily asked. Severus looked to see her determined to help with her wand out, but why was she asking him? Lily did not take orders, or even suggestions well.

"Uh, as long as it's in pieces, maybe try _i__mpedimenta_ to try to slow down its healing?" Severus suggested. How was he supposed to know? They had never covered in Defense what to do if trapped in a room with a werewolf. It was about identification, escape methods and the use of silver weapons.

"Snape, I can't stop this bleeding," insisted Wilkes from the floor nearby. He was trying to use his wand and MacDonald's cloak, but didn't have the hands-on experience that Severus did.

Severus understood why Wilkes wanted him to cast healing charms on MacDonald, but he'd rather be the one keeping the werewolf in pieces while the others got them out of here.

"We need a plan," Severus said, uncomfortable with giving orders to other people who couldn't be bothered to listen to him before. This was not the time to get them angry and turning against him.

"Could you cast _reducto_ on it, Rosier, while I look at MacDonald?"

To Lily, he said, "You can too, if it needs more." Or in case Rosier was unable to cast anything right now, Severus thought to himself.

He knelt next to Wilkes and saw immediately one huge problem. Her hand was gone, and Wilkes was trying to staunch the bleeding at the point of separation. Severus knew what to cast, but he had never cast a tourniquet charm. He had never been this badly injured.

Severus picked a spot and cast it. It worked, but they had to get MacDonald out of here now. Before he started on the long scratches down the front of her to stop her from bleeding out through them, because the charm Wilkes cast would disintegrate shortly, he asked, "Can you transfigure that bed into a strong cage while I try to help Mary? We'll need time to get out of here with her."

Since the spells he had in mind worked best without interruption, he glanced at how Lily and Rosier were doing with the werewolf. Rosier was not as merciful as Severus. He had split it apart so it was now quivering postage stamps.

Feeling that he was not currently in danger, Severus started chanting and crooning over MacDonald's open wounds to close them over. It wasn't St. Mungo's quality, but it worked. Once he was satisfied that MacDonald would not bleed any more from those wounds, he took a moment to check her wrist. Her wand hand was probably bit right off. The problem with the tourniquet was that it also cut off blood to any good flesh too, but Severus couldn't remember how long.

It was a relief to see that the others were able to think for themselves. They were waving their wands to get pieces of the werewolf into the large, thick-barred metal cage. Severus helped them. He could move MacDonald out of here, but did not want to leave Lily behind in case anything else unexpected happened.

Together they all four cast whatever spells they could think of to seal the cage, both the door and in its entirety. They didn't want to leave anything to chance with it breaking out and tracking them.

Both Rosier and Snape kept the _reducto_s going while they discussed what to do next. Lily was impatient, but the boys knew that planning was the key to success, and possibly staying alive.

Wilkes and Rosier agreed that finding out where this sealed house was could save them an immense amount of time, by not having to go back through the tunnel. Severus felt that letting a werewolf loose from this carefully constructed death trap, if he got out of the cage, could land them in huge trouble.

Rosier blasted the boarded window, and Wilkes agreed that they were in the Shrieking Shack. They could see the lights from Hogsmeade. They just needed to get to a floo and they could get to St. Mungo's with MacDonald and Evans.

"Can you get Helen, Snape? I don't want to leave her here in case it gets out," Rosier explained.

Severus looked at Rosier. Pureblooded dunderhead. If he didn't want to leave her behind, he should take care of it. Rather than wasting time arguing, he summoned one of those red blankets from downstairs, and packaged up the pieces. He hoped Slughorn choked on his crystallized pineapple for lying and telling people he wanted to be a janitor.

Lily wanted to help, but she couldn't look at what had been done to Helen. Evan was right, they couldn't leave her here. Probably Severus was the only one of them that could do this without breaking down.

After they were outside, they cast further spells to seal the Shrieking Shack back up. Severus considered it rather clever to use the Shack. If he had managed to get out a scream before the werewolf got him, no one would bother investigating.

By default, Severus got to levitate Parkin's remains as they hurried into Hogsmeade. They could warn others before heading through a floo. Let them deal with Black's werewolf. They could also let them know at Hogwart's that they were heading to St. Mungo's.

The Three Broomsticks was the closest open business. Wilkes talked to Rosmerta while maintaining his spell supporting MacDonald. She allowed them use of the floo as soon as she scribbled their names down on her order pad to send a message up to Hogwart's.

*********************************

Filius Flitwick was in his office, catching up on some reading, when his floo turned green. An anxious female voice said, "Hello? Is someone there? Filius?"

"Yes?" he answered.

"It's Rosmerta. Neither Albus nor Minerva answered. Students were attacked by a werewolf, and took my floo to St. Mungo's. I called Magical Law Enforcement already. Can someone from the school go to London?"

"Absolutely, Rosmerta," Filius cried in response, thinking of what to do. If he took someone else, one of them could stay at St. Mungo's with the children while the other flooed back to let the Headmaster know.

He threw a handful of floo powder into the fireplace and called into the staff room, "Anyone there?"

"Filius?" was the response. It was Atlas Abstractus. Not who he would have chosen since the fellow had a habit of getting distracted, but he'd be able to stay at the hospital.

"Atlas, I need you to come with me to St. Mungo's. Students flooed there."

"Uh … now?"

"Yes. Werewolf attack."

"Oh well, um … of course, Filius."

"Can you floo from the staff room and meet me there?" Filius asked while looking around his office to see if he needed to do anything before departing.

There was hesitation, but Atlas replied, "Yes."

"I'm leaving right now," he said before terminating the connection. Filius threw in another handful of floo powder and announced "St. Mungo's," before stepping into the green flames.

Not entirely trusting Atlas to floo immediately, he approached the reception desk. "I'm Prof. Flitwick. Did some Hogwart's students get admitted?"

"Werewolf attack?" the woman asked.

"Yes," replied Filius, wondering if there were other Hogwart's students that came in tonight to prompt her to ask that question.

"Up on the first floor. Creature induced injuries ward."

Atlas joined him. Before reaching the students, he explained, "I'm not good with violence and blood, Filius."

Prof. Flitwick looked up at his colleague. Someone who found the mathematical explanation for the spread of deadly disease beautiful couldn't stand lycanthropy because it got messy? Arithmancists were a strange bunch. He needed someone to stand with him, and not go falling to pieces. Filius had all of the students for Charms, but Atlas just got to know the Ravenclaws and some others who took Arithmancy. Perhaps if he didn't know these students, he'd be more helpful.

Rosier was out in the corridor with some adult wizards and witches. Slytherin students had Slytherin parents, oh no.

They were spotted. Rosier said with evident disbelief, "Prof. Abstractus?"

"Rosier, Prof. Flitwick and I came …" Atlas petered out, Filius had invited him, not the other way around. He wasn't even a head of house, and dealing with parents? Students who took arithmancy wanted to be there. If not, they dropped it.

"Yes," Filius agreed. "As soon as I heard from Rosmerta at the Three Broomsticks, we came immediately."

"Of course," said a disdainful wizard, who was waiting to know why these students did not rate the Headmaster, or either of their heads of house. Mr. Wilkes already knew the unusual combination of Slytherin and Gryffindor students might confuse the staff because it surely baffled him, but that did not equate to a dismissive attitude. The Wilkes name carried some weight, along with Rosier and especially the dead Parkin girl. MacDonald was a step down for his family, but Malcolm was the younger son. Wouldn't have hurt to marry a girl so interested in breeding to insure the continuation of their name. She wasn't an issue now that she was a werewolf, but it was damned inconvenient.

"She did not have all the details," Filius said trying to diffuse a situation that could be avoided.

Crossing his arms over his chest, Mr. Wilkes said, "One student dead, two injured and at least one of them is a werewolf now. We'll have to wait till next month to find out if the second one ingested any saliva. The other three fought off the werewolf and confined it so it did not rampage through Hogsmeade. They also had to carry a wounded student, and brought what was left of the dead student with them."

Rosier added, "Once we realized how close we were to Hogsmeade, we decided to head there to floo to St. Mungo's. MacDonald's wounds were very serious, and it would have taken longer to carry her back to the castle and up to the infirmary."

"From Gryffindor?" Filius asked.

"Yes, three Gryffindors and three Slytherins. It was my son, Malcolm, Evan Rosier, and Snape, along with MacDonald and Evans. Parkin is dead."

"Where did it happen?"

Rosier explained. He already knew what was told to Magical Law Enforcement so didn't want the story to get muddled. "Sirius Black had told us about a secret passage under the whomping willow earlier today. Since it was a nice evening, and our homework was completed, we went for a walk … well before curfew, to look at it.

"We found a secret passage underneath the tree, just like he described, and followed it. It wasn't until later that we realized we ended up in the Shrieking Shack and off the grounds. The inside of the house had Gryffindor banners and even a case of butterbeer.

"When we got into the tunnel, it was too small so us lads were too big to move through it without crouching. Parkin and MacDonald got way ahead of us, and went up the stairs while we were still in the passage. That's where they were attacked, and we didn't hear. It wasn't until we went up the stairs looking for them that we found the werewolf. It probably heard us downstairs and was waiting. It went right for Evans, but Snape pretty much blasted its jaw off to keep it biting her.

"Then we held it off, while we worked to render some medical aid to MacDonald to move her, and cage it up so we could escape without it following after us."

Atlas only had the Slytherin fellows as students, and they were all fine fellows. He was horrified by the tale. If he were a student, he could imagine hearing of a new secret passage and the temptation to see if it were actually there. Hogwarts was supposed to be riddled with them. However, what was a werewolf doing at the end of it?

Filius listened to the tale carefully. It was believable, except for the part with the werewolf. Normally, he wouldn't suspect a student of being so bloodthirsty, but it was Sirius Black. He heard plenty of complaints regarding him from his Ravenclaws. He was violent and brutal, and especially preyed on the younger boys. Filius knew from personal experience that he attacked indiscriminately. How did he arrange to have a werewolf waiting for other students? Did he pay some poor sod to transform there this month?

"Rosmerta said she also contacted Magical Law Enforcement. They may figure out how that werewolf was present so close to Hogwart's and Hogsmeade." It was not illegal for werewolves to be in the area, but they were supposed to exercise some safety measures for the sake of others. Although fortunate that these were not Ravenclaws, Filius felt out of his element here. Such callous disregard for others, and they were all his students, was overwhelming. If Dumbledore was not at the school, he could track down Minerva and Horace. "You were not injured, Rosier?"

"Not me. Um, the others are inside. The healers might be done with Evans, she's going to have scars but they can be covered up. Might be a bit sore for a bit because it grabbed her shoulders and sank its claws in. MacDonald … well she was mauled and it bit off her hand. That's uh … I don't know. The way it tore Helen apart …"

"Don't think about it, Evan. That's not the way you should remember her," said a young witch, that Filius recognized as one of Rosier's sisters from a few years back. "Maybe we should take you home."

"I don't want to go until they say why that werewolf was there, and who it is."

"They might not know till the moon sets. It could be a muggle who's family got paid off to be there."

Filius got a chance to speak to a healer in charge of this ward, before leaving Atlas to represent the school while he returned to report to Albus, Minerva or even Horace.

*********************************

James couldn't be reasoned with. As soon as detention was over, he raced back to the tower to grab his invisibility cloak and left to prevent Snape from using the secret passage.

Peter considered going, but if there was a mess to clean up, why should he end up helping? He had enough of cleaning this crappy pile of stone for Filch. Any mess would be Sirius' fault, but he was going to hang out in the common room with the other lads. Peter thought that sounded like a fine idea for him too.

Well, it was till Prof. McGonagall showed up. She could really ruin a fellow's good time. Their head also got well … plain nasty when Sirius and him tried to stall because she wanted James too. He could still sneak back into the tower in his invisibility cloak, and trick her into thinking he'd been there the whole time.

Peter was growing concerned once Black was sent through her office floo to see Dumbledore, and then she got sneaky and flooed Flitwick to go watch their common room for James. Peter mentally crossed his fingers that James would beat Flitwick there.

He had seen McGonagall angry plenty of times with her lips thinned and her eyes narrowed as she scolded them for not behaving in what she considered a proper manner for their house to act. Pacing behind her desk with pauses at the window, then standing still and pressing a handkerchief to her face at times, was a McGonagall Peter had never seen before.

About five minutes passed and then she turned on him, "I want to think you are a misled boy, Pettigrew, and that you get caught up in all the excitement of the moment. Why would you go along with anything so transparently wrong?"

"What happened?" Peter asked. Seeing her this upset had him worried that Remus was dead. He wasn't fond of how James and Sirius favored Remus who did nothing, but he had never been anything but nice to Peter. If it wasn't for Remus, he wouldn't even be an animagus.

"Disaster, Pettigrew. One student dead, another critically injured and turned into a werewolf, and another injured who may also be infected."

Peter was saddened to hear this. Remus couldn't be truly injured as a werewolf so he must be the one who was dead. Did he get out and injure someone else? McGonagall knew but hadn't told him everything, but more troubling is what did she know about him? What were James and Sirius saying? And was this an effort to get him to tell on his best friends? Whoever that third person was, it might be someone important and there were going to be consequences. Simply put, Peter Pettigrew did not want to get caught by McGonagall. He replied, "That's horrible, professor."

*********************************

Oh Merlin! Sirius thought when he stepped out of the floo into Dumbledore's office. His father was here. If the headmaster was expecting his old man to be supportive to his son by having him present, he was about to get an earful from both Orion and Sirius. Sirius could do just fine on his own, he didn't need some holier than thou crap spouting out of the foul mouth that touched his overstuffed hag of a mother's body. At least he could count that as a blessing, his mother wasn't here to scream so loud that she could be heard over in the owlery.

Seeing that Ministry flunky that was at James' house over the summer, Sirius sneered at him. He was so low in the ranks he wasted his time chasing down students. How pathetic. If he was smart, he'd be hanging out in the dungeons, if he was interested in catching tomorrow's death eaters, rather than harassing the Marauders.

Wearily Dumbledore said, "Take a seat. Would you rather tell us why you did this, or would you rather answer questions?"

With a shrug, Sirius replied, "What do I care?"

"Are you acting on someone else's orders, Sirius?"

Sirius stared at Dumbledore. What did he think he did? "You should know I don't follow the rules, professor."

"I know. However, did someone tell you to cause all this destruction and to dismantle the school?"

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Then why don't you tell us. You can either start with today, or at the beginning."

Sirius looked around. He knew the headmaster, his father, Bumboil, but there was another bloke here taking notes. "I'm getting tired of all this picking on me. Losing points, detention every night, physical labor in detention, and prefects following me into the gents'. You are purposely pushing me."

Dumbledore frowned, "Your disregard for the rules and safety of others pushed you to send another student to a gruesome death?"

He blinked. If Snivellus was dead, it was his word against someone that wasn't around. Damn. Poor Remus. Why did Snivelly have to be a total loser and get himself killed? He was exceptionally inept because he got himself killed so soon after curfew. Even as a dog, it took Sirius time to run over to the whomping willow and dash through the secret passage. "Death? I don't know what you're talking about."

Staring into Black's gray eyes, Dumbledore could tell he was covering up. How much did he know? He wouldn't have bothered with that secret passage with all the others unless he knew about Lupin. Lupin could have shown it to them at another time, but he wouldn't have risked sharing that knowledge with his friends without warning them not to use it. "The secret passage with the werewolf."

"What werewolf?" came out of Sirius' mouth without thought. Oh no. Peter could be crying and peeing his pants right now, telling everything. He still had to warn James. If Prongs got desperate he might arouse suspicion by trying to get the staff to track down Snape because he didn't know the greasy boil on their collective arse was now dead.

Dumbledore tilted his head to one side in thought. Sirius Black could lie to them all for as long as it took. His purpose was to find out who Black was working for. One student, no matter how vicious and bullying should have been able to trick the Sorting Hat into sorting him into Gryffindor to cripple the source of where this generation's heroes would emerge. What he needed to do was bluff. It was a big gamble to rely on the Slytherins' version of events. "Do you know what a pensieve is? I just happen to have one of those handy devices to review memories, and to allow others to view them. What if we dispense with the deception here, and start by saying I know that you told Severus Snape about the secret passage?"

"So? I didn't force him to go there," Sirius replied. Someone in the hallway must have overheard, unless Snape was able to crawl out of the shack, but how would Dumbledore have the memory from him? Something didn't smell right. Of course, Snape could already be a ghost and went to tattle to the headmaster. Except he wasn't floating around in here with his silvery smirk.

"You told him and didn't warn him of the danger."

"It was just a prank. If he didn't have such ugly, greasy feet he wouldn't have tripped over them when he ran."

"Severus did not run. Neither did the other Slytherins. They worked to save who they could and to overpower the werewolf, before retreating with the wounded and the one dead student."

Sirius was struck speechless. Who would Snape bring with him? And whoever they were, they deserved whatever they got for listening to anything that death eater told them. If Snape didn't lead them to a werewolf, he surely would have led them to some other death.

"I know. Rather odd when we all think of the old saying, that Ravenclaws think their heads, Hufflepuffs with their hearts, Gryffindors with their brass um, you know, and that Slytherins think with their behinds. Since they'd rather keep their behinds safe.

"I'm just curious what you had in mind. You disliked Helen Parkin enough that you and James Potter organized a letter writing campaign over the holiday, and then openly tried to discredit her because she was appointed Gryffindor quidditch captain. A position you felt would be better filled by your best friend, Potter, even if he was banned from playing quidditch here at Hogwart's. Was it just dumb luck that she ended up ripped apart by the werewolf?"

When Sirius took too much time trying to comprehend the impossible that somehow Helen Parkin was lured to Remus by Snape … did Snape already know about Remus' condition, and he was just waiting for a chance to kill someone and blame it on him? With this pensieve thing, maybe, but then there would be other memories of Snape lying to Parkin …

Orion Black growled, "Answer already. You are too dumb to come up with any lie to explain this. Just confess because you are trying all our patience."

"No one asked you," Sirius replied.

Alastor Gumboil was willing to bet once the consequences of this fiasco became apparent, there would be a disowned Black boy. Potter might not be so easy. He had older parents, they couldn't afford to throw their only child away. The Potters' best bet was to influence the Ministry. Paying off other families for the loss of a child or turning them into werewolves would be too expensive and too hypocritical. Although he said he'd remain quiet while Dumbledore asked his questions, he was dancing around the werewolf. Where did Black get it? His boss, Crouch, was eager for news, considering the families involved. He would want facts, not some report of the Black boy's hand being held while he sat around lying. A girl was dead. Two injured and most likely werewolves now. When people were excused from following the law, due to who they were, others suffered. This boy should have been soundly slapped from the moment he started stealing other children's candy, rather than patted on the head and told how clever he was.

"You didn't think that far ahead, or you weren't sure who would end up dead?" Dumbledore asked. To Albus, that was the whole key to knowing that Black was not working alone and had deceived them for years. He pretended Lupin was his friend, and risked everything by exposing his secret with this.

Sirius curled his lip at the headmaster, as he replied, "I said it was all a joke."

"May I?" Gumboil asked. This spoiled pretty boy wasn't used to someone that wasn't swayed by his winning smirk and sly wink.

"Be my guest," Dumbledore intoned.

"You said you were just playing a prank. What I'd like to know is how you got a werewolf into the Shrieking Shack to wait for your classmate. Wouldn't that take planning on your part?"

"I knew nothing about the werewolf."

"You claimed the prank would have been successful if your victim ran and didn't trip. If you weren't sending him into danger, why would he need to run for safety?"

"That was an assumption on my part," Sirius replied, trying to remember what he said. He was positive he already said he knew nothing about the werewolf.

"Alrighty then," Gumboil said. He knew Crouch would expect no coddling of the prisoner, even if his rich daddy was here. Dumbledore would not be able to say 'no' since this went beyond a school infraction. "I'm going to take you into custody overnight. We have the werewolf so as soon as the moon sets, we'll be able to question him. He'll have nothing to lose by cooperating, will he? Probably confess your part in the plan to ease the minds of his family, I suspect."

Sirius stared at Dumbledore. Didn't they know this was Remus Lupin? Dumbledore knew. He arranged to have all this set up for Lupin to be a student, but still have someplace to transform. What kind of game was the old coot playing? He wasn't going to take the blame for this, it was all Dumbledore's fault for letting a werewolf be a student. Once the Ministry found out it was Remus, they'd think that Sirius had planned this whole thing to use his friend as a lethal weapon. If there was one thing that Sirius Black hated, other than the Dark Arts and the now-alive Severus Snape, it was deceit. If Sirius kept it secret, he'd be protecting Dumbledore who was doing absolutely nothing to help him. In fact, he unfairly gave him detention that he'd served for over a month now.

Keeping his eyes on the headmaster, Sirius said, "I can tell you who the werewolf is, and what he was doing there." If Dumbledore was going to make his move, now was the time to do it. He could _obliviate _ these three and then things could return to normal around here.

"I'm not willing to make a deal for the information. You'll still come with me," Gumboil answered.

"It's not a deal. It's a … request for leniency for Remus Lupin. He's a werewolf, but he had no idea I'd be letting others know where he was hiding. He can't control himself when he's transformed."

Dumbledore closed his eyes and bowed his head in regret. Sirius Black knew.

*********************************

James had plenty of time during detention and the run down here planning what he'd do. Arguing with Snape wouldn't work because then he'd know they were hiding something. James was just going to _stupefy_ him, and get him back up to the castle, or maybe one of the greenhouses. It was too cold to leave him lying out here all night. By the time he woke up, Remus would be back inside with Madam Pomfrey.

He waited by the whomping willow for close to two hours for Severus Snape, torn as to whether he was wasting his time, or if Snape was going to come out as soon as James left. James couldn't even be sure what door he'd come out of or his route to try to backtrack the most likely route. And Sirius was such a dumbass at times that he probably wouldn't even thank him for standing out here in the cold.

While he was looking up at the moon, dreading that this was turning into a long night till it set with just a few wispy clouds that wouldn't block it, James thought he started to hear voices. Would Snape bring someone with him? It didn't sound like Hagrid, but it's possible he could have had guests over to his house.

James' eyes widened when he noticed a dim light under the whomping willow. Someone was coming from the Shrieking Shack.

He could make out what the voice now. A female one said, "Give me a boost, will you? I think we finally hit the end."

"Right. Just watch out for that tree," a man responded.

"Yeah, I remember."

A lit wand emerged with a grown witch holding it. She stayed low to the ground until she pressed the knot on the trunk. "The knot was just where they said. Come on up."

"Good. We can walk back right? I don't want to have to crawl through that again."

"Sure," the witch answered, turning around and looking. "If the castle's there, I think the gates are over that way for us to get back to Hogsmeade."

"Can we apparate back to headquarters once we hit the gates? Crouch wants all our reports tonight."

"We better make sure they have everything from the Shack so we don't get sent back out … after we have our arses handed to us."

"Sodding Crouch."

James followed as they started walking towards the gates. Crouch was the head of magical law enforcement. His name was in the paper every day. Did Snape already go through and let Remus out?

"It's not his fault. I thought students were reckless when I went to school, but this … Merlin!"

"I suppose. He'd want to get the facts straight before the Prophet printed something in error. Those families are out for blood."

"Yeah, wonder how Dumbledore's going to come out of this one smelling like a rose."

"What's he got to do with it? Man's not omniscient."

"From what I hear this lad has been terrorizing the students for years here. They all knew it was a matter of time before someone got killed."

"Oh, is that the … that boy that Gumboil ... or was it boys?"

"I think so. That's why Gumboil volunteered so quickly to head the investigation, even though he knows Crouch will be looking over his shoulder the whole time. You know how he gets."

"Oh yeah. None of us joined up to have these high and mighty types treat us like dirt while they kissed up to the Minister for a pardon."

"No respect that some people got to work for a living, rather than having a loaded family vault down in Gringott's belly."

"I hope when You Know Who's defeated, all of them got to pay for what they did. An empty vault won't be much good to them."

"Or a new Minister. I think Crouch is aiming for it. He won't be waving off setting werewolves on people."

"I'd vote for him. He may be a real tightarse, but he doesn't listen to any of these pleas they come up with."

"He's just as mad as us when the Minister pardons one of them."

"More. I've actually seen him mess his hair."

They laughed as they got the gates to open for them. James gave a moment to think about following, but if they were going to complain about their jobs, he wasn't going to find out what happened. Maybe Sirius already had the whole story. Oh darn, was James' thought as he rushed back to the school. Sirius could have ran off to save Remus without him.

When James entered the common room, he didn't stop to think it was odd that it was devoid of students but still fully lit. He was in too much of a hurry to get upstairs.

"Hold it, Potter. I've been waiting for you to return."

James turned to see Prof. Flitwick sitting in one of the deep armchairs. "Professor?"

"Don't you know when curfew is?"

"Yes, but uh …"

"Is that an invisibility cloak over your arm?"

"This old ..."

"Never mind. Bring it with you. You're expected in the headmaster's office. And I can tell you, we're not pleased that you kept us waiting up so long."

"The headmaster?"

"Of course."

"Can I …?"

"No. Now. This very instant. You've postponed this long enough. I'm not here to wait on your pleasure, Potter."

"I didn't say that, Professor, but ..."

"Now. Come on."

All James wanted to do was hide his cloak and see that Sirius and Peter were upstairs. If they went haring off to save Remus, James might have to cover for them.

Although Flitwick was being unreasonable, James cooperated and went with him to the headmaster's office.

When they reached it, Prof. Dumbledore and Prof. McGonagall were there, drinking tea. There were a number of used teacups scattered about the office from earlier. Sirius Black was released to the Ministry for at least an overnight stay, and Peter Pettigrew was sent home with his parents. Pettigrew was probably suspended. He told a convincing tale of how he felt he had to go along with whatever Black planned, however Pettigrew rarely cast a spell on anyone.

Prof. Flitwick entered, saying, "Potter's returned. He returned to the Gryffindor common room at ten after one in the morning. I believe he also was using an invisibility cloak to move around the school, and asked that he bring it with him for examination."

"An invisibility cloak!" exclaimed Prof. McGonagall. If it were true, it would explain quite a lot.

Dumbledore already knew about the cloak, and that wasn't the reason they were here.

"May I go?" Flitwick asked. He had an awful evening, and was not feeling up to listening to Potter spin tales.

"Thank you, Filius, for all your help tonight," McGonagall said.

"Yes, Filius. I'm sorry I wasn't in my office earlier when this whole mess started," Dumbledore added. By the time he was involved, it was too late to stop the leak of information. There would be consequences for him allowing a werewolf to enroll at Hogwart's. It was not Lupin's fault, but Albus did feel a sense of betrayal at the hands of his Gryffindor friends. And now it was Potter's turn.

James was taken aback. McGonagall's eyes were red-rimmed. Had she been crying? Was Remus dead? Did something happen to Sirius and Peter?

"Take a seat, Potter," she said to him, since she apparently had his attention. "We've had a very trying evening, so if you can dispense with the typical denials, I'd appreciate it."

"Yes, ma'am," James replied. He wasn't cowed, but he sensed he knew so little that he didn't know what to respond till he heard the questions.

"Where were you, Potter?" she asked.

"Well, earlier tonight while we were serving detention, Sirius mentioned that he accidentally told something to another student, so I went outside to see if um … he acted on that information because … well, it would have been dangerous."

"Did you warn Mr. Filch about the possible danger?" Dumbledore asked.

"No. I … well, he probably wouldn't have believed me, and it was secret information that maybe only a few people at the school know."

"So which staff member did you inform?"

"None. I mean … I wasn't sure who knew, or if there was even a problem."

Albus felt Potter was trying to be truthful, but was having difficulty working his way around the secrets he was trying to keep. He suggested, "How about I tell you what we know, in order to make it easier for you to explain your part in all this?

"We know that Remus Lupin is a werewolf, and very few people at the school knew. The students, including you and your friends were not told. In order for Mr. Lupin to have somewhere safe to transform, the whomping willow was planted over a secret passage so he could not escape from inside without the use of magic or human-level thinking skills.

"Earlier today, during an altercation in one of the school hallways, Sirius Black told Severus Snape about the secret passage, but did not warn him of the danger of accessing it during the full moon. Would you like to continue from there?"

"Yes. And I want to be clear Remus did not tell us his secret, we followed him and Madam Pomfrey because he was out so much, but the excuses would have seemed more realistic if we were told he was sick, rather than every member of his family twice over."

Dumbledore nodded. It would have been an enormous risk for Lupin to have told anyone who didn't already know.

"So like I initially said, we were in detention and getting in a few words now and then. We're not allowed to talk, and just before it was over, Sirius said he told Snape about that secret passage. I got worried because it is a full moon tonight. Maybe Snape wouldn't have listened since he doesn't trust Sirius, but I wouldn't be able to warn him myself until tomorrow because I can't go into the dungeons. And since the werewolf part is a secret, well … I couldn't go pounding on Slughorn's office door either. So I went outside to guard the entrance, but when a witch and wizard came out of it, I knew that something had gone wrong and came back to the castle."

"Why didn't you at least try to tell someone else, such as Madam Pomfrey?" asked McGonagall.

James' mouth dropped open. Of course, she's in the infirmary all the time and knew that Remus was a werewolf. However, she didn't know that his friends knew, and went blabbing about it to Snape. But if someone ended up hurt or dead, it outweighed the risk. Of course, after the fact, it was easier to see it so clearly.

"Did someone get hurt?" James asked.

McGonagall sniffed loudly before replying, "Yes, Potter. Three … Helen Parkin was killed. Mary MacDonald crippled and now a werewolf herself. Lily Evans was mauled and may also be a werewolf."

Evans! "How … but …" James was having trouble putting this together. Sirius tells Snape and three Gryffindor girls were attacked?

Dumbledore explained, "Those three young ladies inquired after Severus' welfare after this afternoon's brawl, and he mentioned that Black told him of the secret passage. Sadly, whenever a Gryffindor smells a possible adventure, they enthusiastically wanted to investigate it with the fine weather tonight and plenty of time left before curfew."

"Oh no."

"Yes. It was fortunate they brought their gentleman friends along, or else they may have all ended up dead."

"Huh?"

"Two of the young ladies were in negotiations for formal betrothals, so of course, they'd insist that their beaus accompany them on such a beautiful moonlit night, in case the secret passage turned out to be some myth created by Black."

Evans? Betrothed? MacDonald he could believe. She probably talked Evans into it. Parkin had some delusion about playing professional quidditch for the Wigtown Wanderers because they always had a Parkin on the team. If only Evans said something to him. He'd outbid whoever, and then they'd be happy.

This was going to take some thought. This other bloke might think himself in love with Evans if he didn't care that she was all green and marked up. A werewolf though … a girl didn't recover from that. In James' mind, he still saw Evans as she was in June. Lovely with beautiful hair and skin. And now she suffered some injury from Remus. Was it her face, or somewhere else? It could be minor, and it may be that she wasn't a werewolf. Maybe this would be enough to scare whoever off, and then … well, his parents wouldn't be keen on her at first. They wouldn't like her being mauled. And they wouldn't like her being green when they first met her. Crap. Unlike Sirius, James liked his parents. He wouldn't tell them to go … go whatever if they didn't approve of his decisions. He'd have to work this out with them, and then they could present Evans' parents with a formal offer if she wasn't disfigured or a werewolf. Remus looked like crap at least one week a month.

"Are the others alright?" James asked. He almost forgot to respond, with all the planning he needed to do and information he needed.

"Messrs. Wilkes and Rosier have gone home for a couple days. Mr. Snape seemed to have a head injury from earlier in the day so he was readmitted to St. Mungo's. He was truthful and said he did not seek medical treatment from Madam Pomfrey, but I cannot feel that this continued abuse of his person and then waving him in front of healers is doing the school's reputation any good."

Wilkes! Of course, that slimy bastard was laying it on thick with Evans on the train. MacDonald wanted family and money so she must be with Rosier. But Snape and Parkin? If someone wasn't dead and he was unable to restrain his levity, James would think it probable she preferred the werewolf to that. Oh gosh. Did their mutual jealousy of his quidditch skills join them with a common interest? That's just too sad to think about. Parkin was a bit of a dog, but she wasn't that homely.

McGonagall interrupted James' rapidly firing thoughts, "Your parents were here earlier. They are expecting you at home."

"But what about …?" James started. It was so late, and everything had already taken place. What could he do now?

"I think they'd be relieved that you have been found," Dumbledore said. "I can contact them in the morning with my decision."

James swallowed hard. Decision? Was he expelled?

"You can use my floo. I'll open it for you, Potter," Dumbledore said, rising from behind his desk.

"Right," James muttered. "I'm sorry. If I knew it was going to get this … tragic. I would have told Filch, told Slughorn, told everyone I could."

Dumbledore put his hand on his shoulder, "I'm sure you would have, James."

********************************

Remus Lupin came to his senses naked. That was to be expected. What puzzled him was he was not in the Shrieking Shack with his garments stowed up the chimney for him to garb himself before Madam Pomfrey came to fetch him.

He was also in more pain than he usually was, and he felt full. Really full. Like he had gorged himself on all the food on their table at Hogwart's, and then tucked in at the neighboring table to eat more afters.

"Hello?" he called to the grill in the door.

Remus heard someone approach, but the person did not put his face up to the door where he could see it. "What's your name?"

"Um, Remus Lupin. Could I …?"

"You can have the blanket on the bed, werewolf. We didn't want to contact your parents before we confirmed your identity."

His parents? "Where am I?"

"You are in a holding cell. Magical Law Enforcement apprehended you overnight."

Why wouldn't Dumbledore take care of any problems? Why was he a prisoner of the Ministry? "I think there's been a mistake made. I'm a Hogwart's student."

"You may be, but you were a rampaging werewolf when you were brought in."

Grabbing the blanket, he wrapped it around himself. What had his friends done? Or had he gotten away from James and Sirius and then attacked someone? As he wrapped the blanket around himself, he rubbed his hands over his distended stomach and realized what could be inside him.

Remus started puking.

********************************

Lily awoke. She didn't like how St. Mungo's forced sleeping potions on the patients. A sleeping patient was a quiet patient, she thought sarcastically. This room had a window. It was already morning, and she missed everything.

She was out of bed and heading to the door to check on Mary, when she realized Severus was asleep on another bed. He was in hospital pajamas, and from the way he was totally oblivious to her peering at him, Lily knew he was also dosed by a healer. Had he been hurt last night, or did he somehow convince them to let him stay? The other two beds in this room were empty and made up.

Her observation of her snoring friend was disturbed by Healer Pye entering the room. "They aren't so nice down here, Evans. You should get back to bed. I just popped in to check on how my favorite two patients from September were doing."

"Weren't we your only patients?"

"I do other things here, I'll have you know. I'm actually your friend's healer again since he's not damaged by a creature. We don't have a ward for getting injured due to non-magical means," she explained with a smile. "Not much call for it."

"Can you tell me how Mary is?"

"Um, I don't know much. Different ward, different healers. I hardly even know why you're here except a werewolf grabbed you by the shoulders."

"That's about it," Lily said. She was bandaged still, but the pain was greatly reduced from how it felt last night.

Healer Pye turned her attention to Severus and started casting charms.

"What's wrong with Severus?"

"Hm? Oh, someone dragged him out to fight a werewolf when he had a concussion from having his head beat against a stone wall. Helbert was probably going to admit him anyway and call it nerves and hysteria."

"Severus does not get hysteria."

Pye shrugged and suggested, "Severely agitated? Besides, no parent was here to pick him up. He'd have been sent back to Hogwart's so the cracked noggin kept him here."

"Severus was very level-headed when it counted," Lily insisted. She could understand stretching the truth to keep Severus here, but hysteria would be an outright lie. His medical record was messed up enough already without them adding he was prone to some neurosis.

"Probably saved your other friend from bleeding to death, or was it you? You've said like a hundred times that you plan on being a healer. I don't think you ever mentioned Snape was handy with healing charms too."

Lily frowned. She did not know what Severus had cast other than saving her face from getting bitten off. She was aware he stopped Mary's bleeding when Malcolm couldn't, but when they finally escaped and got to St. Mungo's, they hadn't gotten a chance to talk about it because Lily's shoulders needed to be sorted, and Severus was separated from her before her blouse came off.

"I was assisting keeping the werewolf from getting back on its feet," Lily replied. It was terrifying how it kept wriggling back together. It was horrible to keep it under a constant bombardment of spells, but they hadn't gone out there prepared for a werewolf.

Pye nodded as she wrote some notes. Closing the folder, she advised, "Just remember to behave yourself down here, Evans. They like their patients to stay put, and not running all over the ward."

Lily crossed her arms over her chest, but then winced when her shoulders didn't like her defiant hunch. How dare she get talked to like a child? She was sixteen and knew how to act.

With a huff, she threw herself into the chair next to Severus' bed. When was he going to wake up? He did look a lot less green than he did the last time they were in St. Mungo's. Lily wasn't used to seeing his skin against a white background. She put her arm out to study it against the sheets, and then decided to go look in the bathroom mirror at herself.

While she was in there, someone knocked on the door. "Hello, I need your five knuts for the paper."

Crap! Lily knew that from the last time she was here. She didn't have any money. Maybe Healer Pye? When she opened the door, Lily said, "Um, can I pay it later?"

"No. It's five knuts upon delivery. If you didn't want it, you are to suspend your subscription when you are admitted."

Lily didn't like this woman's attitude. How was she supposed to worry about a newspaper last night?

She went over and nudged Severus. When he didn't respond, she shook him, "Severus."

He woke with a shudder, blinking hard, but realizing Lily needed him.

"Do you have five knuts?"

Severus opened his mouth, but couldn't be bothered uttering a response. Of course, if Lily Evans was awake, everyone should be awake. Money, money, money, he thought while trying to fight the effects of a sleeping draught he was given barely four hours ago that was designed to keep a wizard up to twice his weight asleep for at least eight hours.

Rolling over to get his feet on the floor, Severus rose and slowly turned to open the cabinet where his clothes were, and rubbed the area of his robe where he had money hidden under a charm keyed to only him. He counted out five knuts while he wrestled not to yawn and painfully lost.

He gave the money to Lily, and waited for her to tell him what else she needed while fighting off some shivers and another yawn, as the cooling bed tried to lure him back.

When she took the paper and went to sit down to read it, Severus thought two things. The first was 'fuck' in his father's distinctive voice. The second was that being attacked by a werewolf and possibly getting turned into one didn't seem to have changed Lily one bit. He had been fearful that Lily would hold him responsible for the whole evening, or at least part of it. It wasn't, but rational thinking had never been her strong point.

Severus had already climbed back into bed, gotten situated and had taken a deep breath as he closed his eyes, when Lily started talking … to him, since there was no one else here. "I can't believe this. It's in the Prophet but they … I can't believe it. They … oooh! Sev! It's wrong."

Sensing that the pause in her rant was for his response, he said, "So?"

"So? So? There's no mention of Black. Who that werewolf was. Not even that it happened in the Shrieking Shack."

"Cancel your subscription," he muttered.

From a lot nearer, Lily demanded, "And look here at the end … it says 'Other Hogwart's students present were Lily Evans and Severus Snape'."

Severus opened his eyes to a picture of the Hogwart's front gates in his face. "What do you want me to do? At least if it made the paper, we may not be _obliviated_."

"_Obliviated_? Why?"

"That's what the Ministry hires Oblivators to do. Anything they don't like can be made to not happen."

"They can't do that. There's too many people. I'd like to see them try to _obliviate _McGonagall or Dumbledore."

"Well, as you said too many people. That's why the story isn't the way you remember it. Stay quiet, and maybe they'll let you remember it."

"What? Severus! How can you be so … so … so paranoid that you think there's a cover up?"

"Why do you think Wilkes and Rosier are locked up tight in their family homes?"

"They're mourning, Sev."

"Remember this tool?" Severus asked pointing at the byline.

"Barnabas Cuffe? He was head boy when we were in first year."

"And Slughorn's puppet. His hand was so far up Cuffe's arse that you could see Slughorn's lips moving whenever Cuffe talked."

"Severus!"

"It would be simple for Cuffe to kiss up to someone else. He has no self respect. Probably writes for extra salary too. Black could pay plenty to keep his name out, or his family could. Black might think his name in the paper's a good thing."

"But Dumbledore wouldn't let that happen."

Severus looked at Lily and made a face. Why did everyone think Dumbledore was so great? Twelve uses of dragon blood? They already knew ten, and possibly an eleventh when he came onto the scene. And Grindelwald? Someone was sure to beat him, he was a nutter. Severus did not see much difference between him and the war his father fought in.

If Dumbledore were such a great educator, how come his mother did not mention him as one of her favorite teachers? She used to talk about others, even Kettleburn. Although she didn't have Magical Creatures, she did regale young Severus with tales of his colorful personality. One of the leading reasons why Severus did not take his course.

Now that Dumbledore was headmaster, he was free to set his own schedule to be missing from the school, drink tea with Slughorn to discuss all their pressing social engagements, and eat dessert in the Great Hall. A student stashing a werewolf on or near the school grounds was probably worth a couple floo calls to keep things as quiet as possible. Dumbledore wanted everyone's attention on him and He Who Must Not Be Named. Typical Gryffindor.

Just look at Lily complaining she was not prominently mentioned in the article. Why would she want people to think she may be a werewolf now? They could wait four weeks to find out, and then if she was, Severus would have had four weeks to think about it and what he could do. There were married werewolves so he could have legal rights to assist in protecting her. Scars on her shoulders certainly wouldn't bother him, but her craving to eat flesh, even if she wasn't a werewolf, how was he going to deal with that? Severus was going to have to learn the proper way to cook it. His mother boiled everything to kill anything extra in the food, but he knew that was not considered edible by most people. He certainly didn't like it.

"Well?" Lily asked.

"Well what?" he replied. His annoyance was only kept in check by the overwhelming tiredness washing over him.

"You were thinking."

"Yes. I don't have enough evidence to reach a conclusion. Is that sufficient?" Severus asked in return.

"You don't think it a coincidence there was a werewolf there?"

"No, I don't, but it seems extreme even for Black. What good does it do him to kill me off? Even if he had a perfect plan to have me just mysteriously disappear from school and never come back, what does that do for him?"

"I have no idea."

"I don't know, Lily. It's going to take time to figure out, and no one may ever tell us what went into planning last night."

"But we deserve to know. Our lives were in danger."

"We should let the others work on it then. Parkin's family certainly wants to know. Wilkes and Rosier's know people. I'm not sure about MacDonald's, but I'm sure they have questions too."

"What about us, Severus?"

"Lily, neither of us is well. Why don't we wait to see what happens and what information becomes available? Waving a newspaper at me is not going to answer your questions." All this thinking about Lily and her demands for things that were beyond his control was literally making his head hurt.

Lily explained, "I didn't expect you to, Sev."

"Could I have some more time to rest this morning? I was doing things till those healers caught up to me, and it was close to dawn when I laid down." He was exaggerating a bit since dawn in November was later, but how else was he going to get Lily to let up on him?

"You should have said something earlier."

"I didn't know it would hit me this hard, Lily. I usually don't need much sleep, but with whatever potion they gave me and an injury that I thought I recovered from, it's too much."

Lily put her hand on his forehead. This was the second time in a month that Severus admitted such a thing. Maybe it was not a new honesty between them, but her friend just reached a point where he couldn't bounce back from something that laid up others.

Severus reached up and removed her hand from his forehead, but continued holding it. He rolled onto his side to face Lily and looked into her eyes. Was she really going to let him go back to sleep?

Lily remained quiet while Severus drifted to sleep while she held his hand and noticed that one of his eyes was bloodshot. If she hadn't been dosed with various potions, she would have spent the night sleepless till almost dawn too. They could have been killed last night. Not the almost killed that her mother or even Severus used to signify a degree of danger, but as in almost killed because they entered that house and ascended the stairs to face a werewolf. She could have been first up the stairs, if Severus hadn't been holding her hand in the tunnel. Lily could also had her head removed by the werewolf, if Severus had not been close to her on the stairs or hesitated to follow her into that room.

What if she had died last night? She'd never come home from school again for holidays with her family. From school … well, besides Severus … who would do something? Would that matter once she was dead? If Sirius Black could cover up his involvement in Helen's death, would he be punished if Lily died instead? Lily owed it to Helen to do something. What could she do that Helen's parents weren't? Lily had been there, but she was not with Helen in her last minutes. How long had Helen been dead? Severus detected two people upstairs, but they would have heard something if Helen had been ripped apart after that spell. Oh … the werewolf is counted as a person? It was one and Mary as two? None of them had a reason to believe something deadly was waiting in the shack. Just some stupid Marauder prank.

A stupid Marauder prank for Severus. Severus was the intended victim. Would he had been ripped to pieces like Helen? They had speculated that Mary's wand hand had been bitten off because she was able to cast at least one spell at the werewolf before it turned on her, or maybe after it mauled her. Even if Severus had his wand out, if the werewolf bit off his hand that would have been just the first part of him to be devoured. Although Lily should have considered at some point that one of her fellow Gryffindors' pranks could be lethal to her best friend, there was no possible interpretation that would make a werewolf an innocent prank gone wrong. If Severus had died, what would Lily feel? Probably disbelief at first. Her best friend could get hurt, however his inner self was indestructible. Then guilt? Not that she wouldn't have done her best to save him from the werewolf, if she could, but everything before that. Lily knew her own indecisive mind very well, but what if she missed the opportunity to learn what made Severus tick? To simply say she did not understand her best friend of years didn't explain his complexity. She loved what a puzzle he was, when he wasn't being a total prat. A confused prat who said he wanted to marry her. Lily understood some of his logic, but he was so close-minded about meeting others and talking to them to get friendly. If he had ended up a dead confused prat, Lily would have also felt guilt towards how she was not answering his proposal directly. She was beginning to think no one would respect her and make her feel as wonderful as Severus so she'd probably say 'yes'. It definitely didn't mean now, or in January, or over the summer, or even soon after they graduated. Lily had too much to do before that sort of thing. Severus should make an effort to understand her point of view, rather than being so stubborn. Perhaps now that she was injured, and her life threatened, he'd finally concede? Lily missed their newfound physical closeness.

Breakfast arrived as Lily was contemplating how to broach the subject with Severus. She rolled her eyes at his two bottles of stout, but left them for him. Idiot wizards.

Lily finished her breakfast and was getting terribly bored staying in this room. She had nothing to read, other than the unreliable The Daily Prophet. Healer Pye was probably just kidding around, she decided as she left to inquire about Mary and possibly visit her.

********************************

His parents' solicitor had procured his release around dawn, and escorted Sirius home to wait for the Ministry to scratch its collective backside and admit they were wrong. Parkin was a terrible quidditch player, but Sirius had not set out to kill her. He hadn't even tried to get her removed from the house team, just to get James back on it, and in his rightful place as captain. Accidents happen, and she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. If they wanted to hold someone accountable, it should be Snape. He was a lying bastard from what he heard from Dumbledore. Of course, he and the other Slytherins ran. How could Dumbledore believe anything they said?

The truth would come out soon enough. MacDonald and Evans would tell them how they saved the others, and how Parkin was probably the most valiant of them all. Might get a ton of points for their house too, and then Sirius' detention would be over. He went to sleep with a smile on his face to dream about how sad Filch would be when he found out.

Sirius Black was awoken by that foul excuse for a toadying house elf, Kreacher. His mother doted on the loathsome beast. Sirius, on the other hand, did not, and hexed its ears, fingers and towel before it retreated from his room. Why did he need to get up at any time? It wasn't as if he had class for the rest of the week. He had no desire to join his parents for breakfast or any other meal. It was an inconvenience to him to even have to stay here at all. Now if James had gone along with the joke, he probably could have gotten suspended too and Sirius could be at the Potters right now enjoying a lie in.

Some time after Sirius went back to sleep, there was a pounding upon his door along with his mother shrieking. He sneered towards it and put pillows over his head, prior to casting _silencio_. That woman may be his mother, but she was a real trial.

His eyes had barely closed when Sirius was rudely hauled out of his bed by his ankles. He glared at his mother in the doorway who was holding her wand, returning the same glare at her son. Sirius had another thing coming if he thought he was going to lounge around Walburga Black's house like he was on holiday. Her and Orion had lost enough sleep over his latest outrage.

"Get up and dressed. We're leaving for France, and the portkey is already in hand. Kreacher will pack what you'll need."

"Why would I want to go to France?" Sirius asked from where he had been dumped on the floor. He wasn't interested in one of his mother's shopping trips to Paris. Merlin!

"To get you out of England. You have a marriage offer, and we've decided to go ahead and negotiate. Her father's with the French Ministry so as long as you can behave yourself, you won't be brought back here in chains."

"I ain't going."

"We won't keep you out of Azkaban."

"Stop trying to scare me. I didn't do anything."

Walburga studied her son. He was not a good liar. Was he really so mad he didn't understand what a werewolf could do, once he let it loose on other students? No matter, the girl was half-veela and she'd be deciding what was right and wrong for him, if all went well. That's why Orion and her had decided to do this, rather than sending Sirius to Durmstrang. Sirius needed a keeper, even if she wasn't a pureblood. He and his would not inherit, and putting him in France would spare the rest of the family from his embarrassing and very costly behavior. How much would the Blacks have to pay to get this family to take him off their hands? Orion wanted him to serve his time in Azkaban, but Walburga felt that with a wife to guide her older son, he may just settle down. Orion was just a formless lump of clay before she took charge of him.

It wasn't till later in the day, when Sirius met Apolline that he realized that French girls … no, women, were far superior to any female at Hogwart's. She was perfect in every way, and told him confidentially how impressed she was was his roguish good looks. She said her parents had tried to fix her up with other young wizards already, but none of them were as handsome and charming as Sirius.

If Sirius had met her sooner, he never would have planned to remain an unfettered bachelor for most of his life. Whatever their parents were negotiating was unimportant. If they couldn't come to a decision, Sirius was sure he could charm this dainty beauty into eloping with him. Now that he met the woman of his dreams, there was no way he'd let them be parted.

********************************

James was up early. His parents were truly upset with him last night. He couldn't bear the thought that they'd he'd do anything like … whatever it was that happened last night.

First off, he would never betray Remus' secret. Even in jest. Friends didn't do that sort of thing.

Secondly, James was intelligent enough to know that a werewolf was dangerous. Sirius, Peter and him may go out for romps on moonlit nights, but they were always careful to stay away from people. James was not an irresponsible berk.

And finally, even if he didn't like, or maybe loathed, or really hated with all his heart some dark arts-using greasy git, he wouldn't want that person to die a horribly painful death. If he had to exist at all, he should be in Azkaban or have his wand snapped and forced to live like a muggle … in some backwater like Australia or the United States.

The Daily Prophet barely mentioned Evans. Maybe she was alright. Was she back at school in the Infirmary? Probably, since James was stuck at home.

********************************

Lily spent a couple hours in Mary's room in an attempt to cheer her up, but it seemed for naught. They were both having trouble understanding that Helen was really gone. It seemed so pointless. Mary had only become more upset when Lily speculated on why it happened so she tried to focus on the positive, such as Mary's face was not marred. However, Mary was focused on the loss of her wand hand and becoming a werewolf. The injuries crisscrossing her torso that would remain horrible scars were just icing on the cake to her. Lily left when lunch was brought round. Mary's parents were talking about her not returning to Hogwart's and staying home. Home for good.

When Lily walked into her hospital room, Severus was awake and writing. He put aside his quill and asked, "What news have you gathered in your search?"

She rolled eyes at him before she remembered that's what she told him she intended to do. "Nothing. Mary's awake and very upset."

"Of course."

Sighing loudly, Lily looked around and guessed that their meals would be here shortly. "So what have you been up to?"

"Just writing some letters. You should write your parents."

"I will. I'm just not ready, Sev."

"Don't you write home all the time? They'll think the worst if they only receive a letter from the school, or even the hospital."

"Oh darn. What would I say? I mean if I don't mention," she waved one hand around, "this, and they have a letter saying otherwise ..."

"You'll be caught. You keep it simple and say you'll write again soon? You should also mention that you might have contracted something. I don't know. To muggles, a werewolf would sound ridiculous."

"Can't I wait on that?"

"If anyone else says it, they may be angry with you and think the rest of your letter is unreliable. Additionally, you and all of us should be prepared for the worst. You can't go home in June, with a large cage in tow and explain how it's for their own safety. You love your family, Lily, and if you have gotten lycanthropy, would you want that to be the reason you stop seeing them?"

"I wouldn't stop seeing them over that."

"If you start cutting them out of your life now, it'll just get easier as time goes on."

"That's fine advice coming from you. You hate your parents."

Severus frowned at Lily, and tried to choose his words carefully, "I don't believe my family hates each other. Dislike, and perhaps loath, would be more accurate. If I hated them, I would be actively working to make their lives miserable. I don't. It might be fair to say that they are perfectly capable of being miserable without my help, but I don't take advantage of it.

"You have always stressed to me that your family comes first for you, Lily. Even Petunia. I believe I've done my best to respect that, especially when your parents are so hospitable. Would you neglect them due to Sirius Black?"

Lily didn't know what to make of what Severus said about his own family, but when he talked about hers it made sense. Although she was a witch, and only needed to see her family over the summer holiday till she was seventeen, Lily wanted to see them for every break and wrote home much more than other students. Her parents, especially her mother, told her they loved receiving her letters because they missed and loved her so much. She knew they weren't just saying that because Lily felt the same way. Severus understood.

But Sirius Black. She recalled how anxious she was after talking to Petunia when he approached her at work. How angry she still felt after finding out that Black, Potter and Pettigrew were lurking about her neighborhood and abused muggles. If Lily thought her family was in danger due to her, she supposed she would do the right thing and distance herself. It had already crossed her mind that if she was a werewolf, she'd want to avoid her family because of the danger. Perhaps it would be as Severus said, she'd find it easier to make excuses not to see them. She was almost an adult so it would seem natural.

Still, until last night or this morning, Lily had every intention of staying with her family past her seventeenth birthday, and possible for a while after she graduated from Hogwart's. That bullying toerag, Sirius Black, was forcing her into changing her plans … through fear. Even if she saw her parents during safe times, Lily knew how ruthless he was. The lot of them knew the whereabouts of her parents' house. Would it be the greatest prank ever to find out where Lily transformed and set her loose on her own family? Or better yet, charmingly introduce themselves to her mum, let her serve them tea and sandwiches, and then drop a werewolf on her.

Severus recognized Lily was getting angry while she thought. He amended what he said, "Or not. I don't want to offend you by trying to tell you what to do. Whatever you feel is best, Lily."

"It's not that, Sev. I'm worried about their safety and … I don't think I'll be able to stand not knowing for the next four weeks. What'll I tell them come Christmas? Either way."

"Christmas? I don't think you can use King's Cross. Maybe by Easter."

"What?"

"I don't know. No one's bothered to tell me. Since I stay at the school each year, you'd probably be the one they make plans for. Your parents don't have a fireplace that I haven't seen?"

"No."

"Even a temporary floo connection would be out of the question than. Maybe one of the staff would apparate you home through side-along."

"They may not want to risk it. Even though I'd stay inside, my house has a bad reputation for breaking rules."

"McGonagall can be fair," Severus replied to assure Lily, without adding how impotent she was with the Headmaster reversing her decisions. If she was head of Gryffindor in more than just name, no one would have died last night.

"So what do you do when you stay over the holiday, Sev? I don't think I've ever asked you."

Severus knew why Lily had never asked him. She came back all excited, and then spent the next week locked up with MacDonald and Parkin swapping stories. She'd give him the abbreviated version in Potions, gushing over the presents she got. Lily always thanked him for whatever she received from him, no matter how small it was compared to others. "It's quiet. The library is only open a couple hours each day. And the staff doesn't complain if students stroll over to the kitchens and help themselves. Keeps whoever's there out of their way if they want to drink each other under the table."

"Severus! Stop making things up. It was a serious question."

"That was a serious answer. There's so few people there that we all need to sit together. Slughorn told the handful of us that were there my first year that we could go to the kitchens, if we wanted to be excused from eating with the staff."

Lily made a face. Severus hadn't said it in a sarcastic or disdainful way, but Slughorn wouldn't be doing him any favors. It could be as simple as there would be more food for him, if he sent the children away. Dumbledore certainly wouldn't mind a bit more dessert.

As their lunches arrived, Lily realized she had began to dislike Hogwart's. Helen's death may put her close to Severus, but all in all, she couldn't say she personally suffered more than him at school.


	30. Chapter 30 Poor Taste

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 30 Poor Taste

Healer Pye declared Severus was recovered from his concussion shortly after lunch, and told him that someone from Hogwart's would be over to collect him this afternoon.

Lily's healer came by a bit later, after Severus spent some time in the loo, getting his clothes from yesterday cleaned before he changed into them. He also gave Lily a handful of knuts and a few sickles for newspapers, suggesting that she might also want the evening edition for a couple days.

The prognosis for Lily was that she may be able to leave St. Mungo's tomorrow. Her shoulders needed a bit more work for the soreness she still felt, but their appearance now was as good as they'd get. After seeing Mary's condition, Lily didn't feel she had a right to complain, but with magic, both of them should look a hell of a lot better.

Severus looked at her back afterwards and suggested dittany might lessen the redness, but with the dragonpox not faded, the coloration was impossible to guess. With the wounds being cursed, it would not be a simple matter to improve their appearance. They could look in the library and see if there were any ideas. Wizards had been attacked by werewolves for years, but as far as Severus knew, if there was a way to improve the appearance of the scars, St. Mungo's should be employing it.

Trying to make light of it, Lily joked, "I guess I'll need new bathing suits and summer clothes. Don't you need to get a bathing suit too?"

"What for?"

"For our seaside holiday this summer."

"I remember you said you wanted us to go, but I don't recall anything about swimming. I won't need one, but whatever you'd like to do is fine with me, Lily."

"You don't need to know how to swim to wear a bathing suit. Everyone wears them on the beach."

"Not me. I don't like being undressed in front of others."

"Sev, it's not like when they … everyone wears them. Little boys all the way up to real old men."

"I will only make a concession to wear a short-sleeved shirt."

"You'll change your mind once you see. You should have one. Is there a wizard beach, or do they just mix in with muggles?"

"I don't know. I can't recall any of the Slytherins talking about more than a cottage with a lovely view of the water."

"I think we can blend in with muggles."

"I'm sure we could."

"Actually, I do remember some of the blokes wearing colorful shirts with their swimsuits, with buttons up the front and with short sleeves. I'll have to keep my eyes out for something like that for you," Lily said, without revealing that to Severus that she was thinking of a Hawaiian shirt. There had to be one in existence that he didn't find objectionable.

"Will I have some input into that choice?"

Lily shrugged and airily said, "Not if you're going to be difficult."

"I won't disagree with you, Lily, until I have an idea what you mean, but undressed from the waist up in public is out of the question."

"Do you find my summer clothes offensive, Severus?"

"No, I'm talking about my personal preference for myself."

"We can try to fatten you up a bit first."

Severus sighed. Although this conversation took Lily's mind off herself and her girlfriends, it was rather pointless. Either way she meant this, either planning her holiday that was months away or some ploy to get him undressed was inappropriate at this time. Although some people drifted through life with a 'better them than me' attitude when something unfortunate happened, Severus had not considered Lily one of them. Had her ire burned itself out until she saw the next newspaper?

"Well?" Lily asked, when her friend didn't reply.

"It's hard for me to concentrate on something that seems so far away."

For Lily, it was even longer now that Severus brought up that she may not see her family till June. That's why she was already wishing it was here already. She asked, "Are you going to be alright, going back to school without any of us from last night?"

"What do you propose? Should I trot out of here and find my way to the train station to head home?"

"There's no need to be sarcastic."

"I don't know what you mean, Lily. What choice do I have?"

Lily stopped herself in time before the old adage 'we all have choices' flew out of her mouth. Unless she caused Severus a significant injury that would take time to heal, he had to leave St. Mungo's. Someone from the school was coming to collect him, and if it was anyone competent, they wouldn't leave without him, even if he left to hike to the train station this very moment.

"I'm simply concerned," Lily explained.

"Hopefully something happened at the school. I can't see parents willing to leave their children at risk if all that self-serving idiot does is hand out more detentions. Parkin was Gryffindor's quidditch captain. If she wasn't safe, no one is."

"Where would they go?"

"I suppose they could try to transfer to another school, but I'm not sure if that's ever done. I don't recall any students transferring to Hogwart's since we've been there."

"Which other school is closest?"

"I'm not sure. They're also unplottable so I just have a general idea. At Beauxbatons, they speak French, and Durmstrang may be in Bulgaria."

"Bulgaria? Isn't there another school where they speak English?"

"Not our English, but there's a school in Australia, Canada and there might be a couple schools in the United States. I don't remember which country in South America has their school. If I had to pick a school for myself on a whim, maybe Egypt."

"Why?"

"It's older than Hogwart's. That's got to be worth something."

"Hogwart's would do something first, wouldn't they?"

"I don't know. Whenever I've gotten my hopes up that perhaps the Marauders have gone too far, they haven't gotten punished, or real punishment. Taking points when the whole house mocks the point system is nothing to them."

"McGonagall changed that."

"What good did it do? Don't they sneak out of detention anyway?"

"Pettigrew was only caught that one time."

"If Pettigrew sneaks out, I'm sure the others do."

"Probably."

"Will you write me?"

"Aren't you coming back tomorrow?"

"We won't know till then, Sev. If you write tonight, I may get your letter tomorrow morning."

"I don't know what I'll find out in a couple of hours."

"Use your Slytherin cunning. Trade information if you have to."

"What information?"

"You were there. Any nincompoop that reads The Prophet knows they're hiding something."

"What if I don't want to talk about it?" Severus replied. Unlike his Gryffindor foes, he had nothing in common with them. Rehashing 'victories' wasn't in his nature, especially when last night did not leave him feeling the least bit victorious. He did not want to press whatever newfound luck he had that allowed him to escape unharmed with Lily alive. Strutting around as a defeater of werewolves would put a big target on his back.

"Think of it as a plot to foil the Ministry's obliviators."

"That's no laughing matter."

Lily was getting nowhere with Severus. If they were split up, and she went back to Hogwart's first, she'd write to let him know what had happened there, rather than letting him just stroll in unawares. Of course, Lily would be able to find out more in Gryffindor house. Pettigrew would be broadcasting it in their common room for everyone to hear.

She reached out, and Severus took her hand. Lily was afraid, but did not want to show it. She didn't want to admit that other students would try to kill any of them. It was not an accident. Helen was dead, and it wasn't from falling off her broom to smash into the ground. She was viciously torn apart, and a boy from their house set up the death trap. Even though he hadn't meant it for Helen, Sirius Black didn't like her and made no secret of it. Would he just shrug his shoulders, plaster a cocky smirk on his face, and hope to have better luck next time? Would Dumbledore allow Black to have a next time? If not Black, what about Potter? He was a bullying, possibly equally murderous, toerag too, who also did not like Helen Parkin. Pettigrew … well, Pettigrew was a lot of talk and inspired the younger Gryffindors to imitate their heroes. Pettigrew by himself was nothing much. And finally, Lupin. Well, Lupin stayed out of the fighting, ready to provide their alibi if they were caught out of bounds. But Lily had the true measure of Remus Lupin. He was a callous abuser of rules too. She'd never forget how he said he returned for the Hogsmeade weekend after his grandmother was so sick that he needed to go home. He may pretend he was the nice one, but Lupin was as shallow as the others.

It was while Lily was in this dark frame of mind that Headmaster Dumbledore entered their hospital room. He pleasantly said, "Ah, here you are together. I just finished visiting with the MacDonalds down the hall."

Neither Severus or Lily said anything in response. Lily glared at his periwinkle robes with matching hat and shoes with lavender sparkling moons and stars, including a silver cresent moon dangling from the tip of his hat. Even if Lily had such a fine selection of robes, she would have chosen something a bit more somber to visit students attacked by a werewolf. The projected levity of his attire was insulting.

Severus did not care what Dumbledore wore. It was constructed to draw attention to him, which is exactly why Severus paid it no mind It went with Slughorn's crap, dress like you are important and people will think you are important. Severus heard it, but he had no options to dress important. His father's old clothes were all he had in addition to his frequently targeted uniforms. Though he failed to see how fancy pajamas were supposed to command respect, unless the viewer made the assumption that the wearer's daytime garb was equally grand. It was all an act to cover up nothing of importance would be said, and even less action would be taken.

Undeterred by their lack of greeting, Albus noted they were holding hands. This time Miss Evans was in bed, and Mr. Snape was her visitor. With the dragonpox, he may have overlooked this connection which led to the interesting combination of three Slytherin lads with three Gryffindor lasses last night, working together as a team. The disease had been explained due to their homes being so close, but perhaps it was something more. Atlas' theory about the spell put them in closer proximity, and Albus was now positive that Severus Snape was somehow important. This was the second attempt on his life in three, maybe four, months.

"How are you this afternoon, Miss Evans?"

Rather than settling for a polite response that conveyed that she was fine, Lily answered, "One of my friends was ripped apart. My best friend picked up the pieces of her body. My other girlfriend had her wand hand bitten off, is definitely a werewolf now, and may not be able to come back to school. Both of them had big plans for the future, and now they don't.

"I may be a werewolf. I'm sixteen. I feel horrible. Even if I'm not a werewolf, I will see that beast in my mind for the rest of my life. The scars on my shoulders, they're cursed, so they'll always be there even when I'm dead and cold."

Lily thought Severus was signaling his support by the slight tightening of his hand. If he wanted to warn her to be quiet, he would squeeze it harder.

"I'll have to see what I can do."

"See what you can do? Have you done anything yet?"

"Hogwart's is working closely with Magical Law Enforcement. They already have Remus Lupin, who was the werewolf."

Together, Severus and Lily repeated, "Lupin?"

Severus backed off. If someone was going to be impudent, a Gryffindor would get further with Dumbledore. After a glance at Severus, Lily continued, "Did you know?"

"Yes, I felt that Hogwart's is open to all students."

"Why was he just left loose than? Doesn't he need to be confined for safety?

"He was."

"No, he wasn't. He was loose in that building, and which staff member was assigned to keep watch on him? An unsupervised, unfettered werewolf at the end of a secret passage is what we walked into."

"A werewolf is unable to leave through the whomping willow by itself."

"What makes you say that? From what I saw, he could take quite a beating and keep going. The whomping willow wouldn't have stopped it, if it was determined to get out. And why is Sirius Black sending other students in there to get killed by his pet werewolf? You say it couldn't do anything by itself, but Black's sending it unwitting victims. He was taking advantage of your laxness."

"I agree he was. Mr. Lupin's roommates had investigated his disappearance each month, found out, and Mr. Lupin did not report it. Even he could not have imagined how his friend would abuse that trust."

Severus fought to keep his lip from lifting into a sneer. Abuse of trust? Lupin was as guilty as Black, if he knew in advance that Potter, Black and Pettigrew knew where he was put away, and how remiss the school was in protecting anyone from getting to him. Lily was right, there should have been a staff member with him, and Lupin should not have had run of that house and tunnel. The whomping willow wouldn't have stopped a werewolf if he decided he liked the smell of Hagrid's cooking, or saw a rabbit or female student hopping across the lawn.

"I could imagine it. What more did they need to do to prove to Lupin that they are untrustworthy, liars and bullies? They attack students, prefects, muggles and even a teacher. He was with them, watching the show with the rest of their admirers," Lily declared. Was she supposed to feel some pity for Lupin? Surely he knew what he was capable of as a werewolf? The whole reason why werewolves were not to be persecuted was they were supposed to show a beyond reasonable degree of safety towards others. Lupin may be sixteen, but if he wanted to throw his life away for a bit of fun with the other lads, he shouldn't have been so selfish as to have no thought for his fellow students.

"Mr. Lupin is regretting his degree of trust. His trial has been scheduled, and it is likely he will be sent to Azkaban."

"And Black?"

"His family's solicitor had him released to his parents, however Magical Law Enforcement continues to build a case against him. At the very least, he is expelled from Hogwart's."

"He should be punished as severely as Lupin," Lily insisted.

Lily's moral outrage was properly placed, but Severus knew that Black didn't need school. He didn't need NEWTs to find employment. If the Ministry let him out the door so quickly, they were already in the process of losing all their notes that this even happened. With Dumbledore favoring Black so much at school, it was unlikely he'd do anything as Chief Warlock of the Wizengamot. They had Lupin to take the blame, even if he was a fellow Gryffindor. He had heard Gryffindors misdirect blame for years now. Black never admitted anything, even when caught red-handed.

"It's in the hands of the Ministry now. Messrs. Potter and Pettigrew have been suspended, and will return to the school at the beginning of December."

"What was their part in this?"

"Mr. Black informed them about his plan, but they failed to report it. Since they didn't know until after you were attacked, they would have been unable to save you."

Lily's brow furrowed and her mouth opened slightly. Black was a maniac, but Potter and Pettigrew went along with it? If they didn't know they'd be too late to get help, the toerags should have done something. They were just a big a problem as Black. Wasn't there some sort of legal precedent that if you know a crime is going to be committed, you have a responsibility to report it? In addition to helping the possible victims, they'd have also helped Lupin not kill someone. Another two that Lupin shouldn't have trusted.

If Lily wasn't sitting in bed, she'd need to sit down. She was feeling faint at the thought that all four of the Marauders were so bloodthirsty and uncaring. Black sent others to their deaths, Lupin knew that the other three knew that he was left where anyone could reach him, and Potter and Pettigrew thought it perfectly fine. And the little lads of Gryffindor thought they were their heroes.

"You are rather quiet again, Mr. Snape."

To be annoying, Severus nodded. What did he need to say? He saw it written on Lily's face. It was sad to see her overcome with the realization of how people were, but she had ample opportunity to observe them, along with Severus telling her they were no good. Dumbledore never listened to a word he said in the past anyway so his words would not have added anything to Lily's outrage.

"You were quite the hero I hear. Two life debts?"

There was no keeping the sneer off his face this time. He snarled, "I don't need Evans to owe me anything, and MacDonald has enough to worry about."

Lily blinked. She did owe Severus a life debt. She could feel it in her heart. Was it his choice or hers how she would repay it?

Albus got a very clear picture that went with Severus' denial. He thought Albus only lifted a finger to get others indebted to him, and may arrange their life-threatening situations. Where did Severus' anger and false impression of him come from? He heard rumors of Tom recruiting in Slytherin house, although Horace assured him they were false. It was confusing. Snape and Evans were not purebloods, and wasn't it Tom or one of his that wanted Snape eliminated?

"I didn't mean that. I'm sure your reasons were altruistic, my boy."

Severus continued to glower. 'My boy' again. What a pompous ass. What would be next … 'son'? Tobias put more affection into his insults of Severus than Albus Dumbledore did with his false kindness. Dumbledore had a huge part in what happened last night, even if he wasn't physically present. By this afternoon, he'd say 'oh well', and sit down for his sugary banquet with Slughorn and continue planning which parties they'd attend along with what title or award Dumbledore could win next. Now that Dumbledore won Spella Weekly's 'Britain's Best Dressed Wizard Award' again, it was probably time to see if Which Broomstick would sponsor a custard eating contest.

When Severus resumed his silent vigil of Miss Evans, Dumbledore could feel he was hostility at both him and … Horace, but the reason was not clear. Albus had a sneaking suspicion it may involve the Ministry's investigation into physical abuse at Hogwart's. Still, both Horace and Poppy sounded very matter of fact that the boy regularly saw the school nurse for ailments and jinxes, but with the high degree of mischief at the school, someone had stolen pages out of his record and substituted a forged note from Horace. Poppy was quite embarrassed that the incomplete file had been turned over to St. Mungo's in the early stages of her dragonpox crisis. If he was certain of one thing, Poppy was selfless when it came to the welfare of the students.

"Well, I suppose we should be going. Do you have any bags, Mr. Snape?"

"No."

"We can apparate from the lobby."

"I'm sixteen."

"No problem. I can bring you along," Albus replied warmly. Students always found that to be a treat.

"No, you won't. I'll floo to Hogsmeade and walk," Severus replied. What kind of fool did Dumbledore take him for? Could apparate them into the North Sea, and then pop away to his tea party, leaving him to drown or die of exposure.

"We could floo directly into my office, my boy."

"Alright," Severus snarled. If they could floo directly into the castle, why would apparating to the gates and walking up have been the first offer?

*******************************

Lily did receive a letter from Severus the next morning. Since he felt they got the more important facts from Dumbledore, he described how the students appeared. Overall, they were angry. Since none of the Marauders were at school, they could openly show it without fear of reprisal. Severus was not sure how the Gryffindors overall were taking the death of their quidditch captain. He thought the girls were showing their grief, but he wasn't sure if the boys were being stoic or quietly supporting their heroic examples until they returned.

Regulus Black and Barty Crouch, Jr. were opposites on what they thought should happen with Black, Lupin, Potter and Pettigrew. Rather than letting his personal feelings influence him, Barty was positive his father would not allow such a barbarous act go unpunished. Regulus felt that his brother would not get anything severe because 'Blacks did not go to Azkaban'.

Lily felt that Severus' letter was too short. Knowing him, he had probably retreated to the Slytherin dungeons as soon as possible. At least he kept his sarcasm in check, and kept it neutral. There was not a single insult, not even of the Gryffindor lads.

_The Daily Prophet _did report Remus Lupin as the werewolf, but rather than speculating on him being a student at Hogwart's, easily accessed by other students, the paper rehashed Helen Parkin's unfortunate death. Barnabas Cuffe again. If Lily had not made up her mind to be a healer, she'd give Cuffe a run for his money. Why didn't wizards have responsible and investigative journalists? Female journalists looking to unearth a good story were Lily's favorite heroines on telly.

After she visited with Mary, Lily was cleared by her healer to leave St. Mungo's. Prof. McGonagall came to fetch her, and they flooed back, without any suggestion of apparating.

*******************************

James' parents were attacking him together, and then taking turns so they could rest. James wasn't given that luxury. He understood what the were saying, but until this week, no one's life had been in danger.

He felt their disappointment and honestly tried to evaluate every decision and prank he had made since he first went to Hogwart's. James realized that Sirius and Peter were big factors, but he had no good reason to act so callously towards others. He still wanted to make exceptions. Slytherins, Death Eaters, users of the Dark Arts … all in one person, Severus Snape. He was not a helpless victim.

His mother ruthlessly dissected James' motivations. How is a first year student a Death Eater and using the dark arts? What did he cast at James? What did James see him cast? Who had he injured, other than James and his friends?

His father also attacked the Slytherin prejudice. Fine wizards emerged from that house. Barty Crouch, Sr. was as ambitious as they come, but a dark wizard and Death Eater? Never. Anyone who met him knew he hated the dark arts with a passion.

All James could come up with was that he and his parents would agree to disagree. Though they presented the oddest argument to close the topic. If this Snape boy and the other Slytherins were users of the Dark Arts and about to become Death Eaters in a couple years, why did Lupin survive meeting them? The three of them were unharmed and capable of casting spells. The Killing Curse would have ended their encounter with Lupin, and it was likely that any of the girls that were still conscious would agree to their story to dispose of the body and claim the werewolf had run off.

It would have been convincing to James, but they never met Snape. He was a freaking, friendless oddball up to the greasy roots of his hair in the dark arts. If he didn't cast the Killing Curse, he had a reason.

Despite the Snape issue, all this introspection was doing James a world of good. He was struck with an epiphany. Could Evans not like him because she perceived him to be an insensitive bully? It seemed unlikely because James had everything a girl could want – looks, charm, money, the Potter name, and was an excellent quidditch player.

*******************************

Lily became overwhelmed when she entered her bedroom. There were only two beds, and all of Mary's and Helen's items were gone. There were no one's else's trunk here but hers, so Lily did not know if there was a reason for the second bed to be here. She threw herself onto her own bed and began crying.

A few of the other girls stopped by during the evening to talk to her. Her fellow Gryffindor ladies were genuinely sad, rather than just displaying anger and vowing revenge, as they had in the past against the Marauders.

By morning, Lily felt she could attend class. It was going to be difficult, but if she'd have to return to class sometime. No time like the present.

She had Transfiguration with Severus and told him about the changes in her room. He listened, but he had no idea why there was still a second bed there, but speculated that maybe another student, perhaps from 5th year, would join her.

Lily had not thought ahead to Divination. Initially she was sitting alone, but two Hufflepuffs joined her. They were polite and only referred to the werewolf attack obliquely by saying that Lily appeared to know what she was doing in this class. It wasn't until the professor said she received full marks and gave her ten points for Gryffindor that she remembered Severus' chart that she had made a few months ago. If Helen and Mary had done each other's chart, would they have had any clue as to what was coming?

With the change in weather, Severus and her ate their lunches with their houses before walking to Herbology together. On the way down, he mentioned, "With Rosier and Wilkes out for a while, our room is being used by some of Mulciber's and Avery's friends."

"I think you should tell someone," Lily insisted. Severus was in the midst of those horrible boys.

"About what? They aren't planning anything. There's some rumor that their Dark Lord is the son of a muggle and a squib."

"What?"

"Exactly. It's insulting, but rather juvenile in composition. Oh, and be wary of anyone using that title, Dark Lord, to refer to He Who Must Not Be Named. They are very consistent in its use."

"Why would they even believe something like that? I mean I know they don't care for someone with one muggle parent or grandparent, but then to add a squib?"

Severus shrugged, "From what I overheard, the friends of theirs that have met him say he's got an air of mystery about him so this brings the questions up again."

"None of them have met him?"

"I'm not sure if any of them have. Gibbon claimed that he ate dinner at their house over the summer holiday, but he lies about most anything."

"Are any of them claiming to be Death Eaters?"

"Not near me. Besides, what service could a student do for him? If they spent their time specifically targeting mudbloods ..."

"Sev!"

"What? That's the word, Lily. If they made it obvious they were after non-purebloods then? They don't like half-bloods either, but their hearts really aren't in it when they insult me. They say 'mudbloods' in a specific way, that they don't use with me.

"So I think Dumbledore would eventually get the hint and do something. He may not care about the Marauders attacking students, especially those younger than them, but he'll want to punish Slytherins for being bullies."

"The Headmaster is not supposed to play favorites, Severus. Besides, he's pretty chummy with Prof. Slughorn."

In Herbology, a Ravenclaw joined them at their table. He was one of the fellows that wanted to discuss the Ministry's policy regarding the Unforgivables with Severus. He did not have much to say today, and limited his comments to their Herbology assignment.

After class, Severus caught Lily's elbow. "Let the others go ahead. I forgot to ask you something."

Lily allowed the group to head up to the castle without them, and they slowly walked up.

"Did anyone from the school say what they were going to do next month for you?"

"Um, Prof. McGonagall said that something would be arranged, but not what."

"Find out in advance. If you transform, and they are as lax with you as they were with Lupin … well, you know who pays the price. You will."

"Right," Lily said in a defeated tone. She had written her parents. Severus did have the right idea when he was concerned that if they received some letter from the school or healer, and nothing from her, they'd grow overly concerned. Not that Lily minded them being concerned because that's what parents do, but she didn't want them to worry incessantly about things that were beyond all their control.

She then asked, "Have you given it any thought, Sev?" If the school wanted a werewolf proof bunker, Severus would be the one to devise it.

"Some. Although there's a sort of humaneness to letting a werewolf have some room to run around, I wouldn't consider that shack ideal. I think outside would be better for a werewolf. For long term, maybe a large fenced in area to include things that werewolves enjoy. I haven't spent any time researching that yet.

"However humane, it is ludicrous to allow people free access to it while transformed."

"I agree."

"So for now, since we don't know, I think a simple strong cage. That should be in a secure area of the school that can be sealed off. A simple charm to detect if you leave the room, should trigger sealing that section and also an alarm to either the Headmaster, or someone on the staff that could be bothered to check. Someone should be present down there, in addition to you.

"I also thought about house elves. They have magic, are a line of defense for the students and the school, and can apparate for help."

"Are house elves afraid of werewolves? Can they get lycanthropy?"

"Those are good questions, Lily. I don't know. They are able to defend themselves when given specific orders, and if you do turn and get loose, any magic they use on you would only temporarily damage you."

"What about you, Sev? Can you be with me, outside the cage, I mean?"

"I would like to, but won't you …," Severus stumbled over his words, then corrected himself, "I would not perceive you being unclothed to be a problem. I can overlook that for the reason why we'd be there."

"Unclothed?" Lily asked.

"If you have on clothes when you transform, they'll be ruined. After the moon sets, they'll still be in tatters."

"Oh, right. Um, I guess a cloak or blanket, and then someone can _accio_ it out so I don't rip that up?"

"That should work."

"I guess Prof. McGonagall would not want you in the room with that um ... lack of propriety."

"If guarding you falls solely on McGonagall's shoulders, maybe myself or male staff member can give her a break between moon rise and set so she can get some rest. There's more male staff than female, and I think Pomfrey needs to stay near the Infirmary."

"She can leave. I've seen her eating in the Great Hall."

"I didn't say she couldn't. The students should also be there too during mealtime, but there might be some charm on the door up there that let's her know she had a patient. However, for hours during the night for a few nights per month … and she can't just floo up there and leave you alone, if there's a rule established that you cannot be left unattended."

"People break rules all the time, Sev."

"I know. That's how we ended up with this situation. Barely any thought given to others' safety by putting Lupin in that shack, both by the school and his parents."

"Oh my, I hadn't given them any thought."

"You have to remember, Lily, all those times he was pretending to be going home. Lupin may not have been close to his family at all."

"Hmm. I guess they would have been told by Dumbledore something about where Lupin would be. If it were my son, I'd probably want to see it, before I allowed him to come here."

"You would, but some would just take Dumbledore's word, or there's even a possibility, probably quite slim, that the burden of having their son become a werewolf at such a young age had taken a toll on them. To have someone else take on that burden, might have been a relief."

Lily opened her mouth to respond, but gave it some further thought. She understood what Severus was saying. The only thing close she had to that was when her parents were going out for the night while Petunia and her were still young and hired a sitter. But her parents were still the ones responsible for their well-being and needed to select a responsible individual. Did Lupin's parents consider that Dumbledore sounded responsible, but when the time came for him to do the right thing, he'd let them down? Costing them their son.

This had ruined so many people's lives. Sirius Black was the catalyst, but he wouldn't have been as effective if others had cared.

*******************************

Remus' parents were his visitors, whenever it was allowed. They brought him clothes and cried. His mother did not seem to stop crying. His father tried to be strong, but sometimes even a man cries.

He cried too. Remus couldn't believe he killed Helen Parkin. Well, he did believe it, but couldn't fathom how she met him as a werewolf. He also cried because MacDonald and Evans were infected. A curse he wished upon no one.

Also tearing him apart was the lack of explanation. No letters and no visits from his friends.

His parents tried to tell him that it was his friends who arranged for the other students to unknowingly come upon him, but he could not believe. No, Sirius Black, James Potter and Peter Pettigrew would never do such a thing to him.

The Marauders also promised to stick together. His parents had it all wrong. They were not feigning they hardly knew him to stay out of trouble themselves. They wouldn't.

*******************************

After dinner, Lily agreed to join him in the library. There she confessed to Severus that she did not want to spend time alone this weekend. He agreed that other than meals and past curfew, he'd be more than willing to keep her company.

The bareness of her room was weighing upon her. If it were Severus, he'd find the lack of his Slytherin roommates to be paradise. Spinner's End may be a shithole, but he had his own room there with a lock reinforced to the point that his father could not enter without his mother's aid, which was very unlikely.

Together they did homework and a bit of werewolf research. Rather than the normal Defense curriculum, they were now interested in how one lived with the disease or curse. The first person accounts turned out to be the most informative since there was no guide on how to care and feed a werewolf in the family.

It wasn't till Severus mentioned that he accepted that Lily would be craving meat with every meal that she realized she had been devouring Gryffindor lad-sized portions of bacon, sausage, chicken, roast, and whatever had once lived that got within reach of her since she returned to Hogwart's.

"Does that mean I am definitely a werewolf than, Sev?"

"No, Lily. Anyone who gets a cursed wound craves flesh. I … I don't know much about what makes it appetizing, but I'm willing to learn."

"You don't have to eat it for my sake."

"I wasn't, but I should have some idea of how to tell good from bad and how it's prepared properly."

"Oh, well uh ..." Lily thought this line of talk would lead them back to discussion about their future. Together, if Severus was the sole decision maker. "I can learn too. My dad raves about mum's pot roast."

"Between Mrs. Evans and Hogwart's house elves, I wouldn't need to learn anything."

"True," Lily replied brightly, having avoided that sore subject. She wanted Severus' pleasant company, not his argumentative and stubborn self. Since her best friend was not one to be optimistic, Lily was assured by his presumption that she was a werewolf, and therefore was not the least bit put off by it. He was thinking of how her daily life would change, and what they should do when she transformed. Strange as it may be, it was a relief that her one and only deranged marriage proposal had not been withdrawn.

Severus got a little dreamy, and wondered if their house had a bit of land, would they be able to raise animals on it, or would that be too much trouble? Of course, if Lily saw them more as pets, she wouldn't want to eat them and that would defeat the purpose of raising and taking good care of them.

"Did you want to go up to Ravenclaw tower before curfew?" Lily asked, since the librarian was announcing it was closing time.

"Alright. Let me just get out these two books. I'll read them tonight to see if there's something they did, that we haven't thought of."

"At least we know now that this fellow's house elves weren't afraid of him."

"Outside of Hogwart's we don't have house elves so we will need to plan beyond June."

"Yes," Lily agreed, fervently hoping she was not a werewolf. Was there a way to buy a house elf? Lily didn't necessarily want it for housework, but it sounded like an excellent safety measure.

Although they left the library hand in hand, both were alert to their surroundings. The four Gryffindor Marauders were not the only dangerous students in the school. As they got closer to Ravenclaw, they did not see any Slytherins or Gryffindors, other than themselves.

They waited till no Ravenclaws were passing before turning off into the side corridor, and following it around to the last window with the night view of Hogwart's. It was Severus that suggested, "We can sit on one side, with you leaning against me. The sill is wide enough."

Not sure what Severus meant exactly, Lily agreed, "We can give it a try."

He sat, and put his leg against the window and invited Lily to sit directly in front of him, with her back towards him, then brought his other leg up while putting his arms around her. She could feel him all around her. His legs pressed against hers, which were together between his. His chest against her back, and then his arms. Not holding her tightly, but there.

Lily's mind wandered a bit as she looked out the window. Sev's nose was near her ear, and she could hear him breathing. He moved his head a bit to rub his chin against her shoulder. This would be nice, if Lily wasn't distracted by thinking about how close it was. Just behind her lower back or her bum … Lily shifted to try to feel if it was a broomstick or a sleeping snake.

When Severus asked, "What's wrong, Lily?" She felt guilty. He was being nothing but nice and holding her at a time when Lily really wanted to be held, and she was obsessed with thoughts about Sev's penis. What was wrong with her? Yes, he really was asking the right question, but Lily had no answer.

"Uh, the stone's a bit uncomfortable."

"Did you want to fold your robe and put it under you?"

"No," Lily replied. She didn't want more layers of fabric between them.

"Did you want to move to another spot on the sill?"

"No, this is fine."

Severus did not say anything more, but raised his hand and ran his fingers through Lily's hair.

Now she knew she was going crazy. Why would this feel so good? Lily sat still in shock, just feeling the way he combed her hair with his fingers, and then traced them over her forehead and over her ears before resuming touching her hair and then walking his fingers over her scalp.

Lily raised her hand and touched the side of Severus' face before working her way back to his ear and then his hair. It was still clean. If he had stopped washing it when he changed medicine, Lily would be able to tell by now.

He stopped moving his hand through her hair, and rested it against her head. Severus then pressed the side of his face against hers and dropped his chin so it rested on her shoulder.

Turning her head slightly, Lily could see Severus had closed his eyes. He barely did that when they kissed. As Lily was trying to figure out if something as simple as this was what Severus wanted, she felt a slight quiver go through him, most noticeably as his knee jerked against her leg. His eyes stayed closed. He initiated this sort of touching. She supposed if he was getting twitchy because he disliked it, Severus would open his eyes to look for an escape route.

Emboldened, Lily turned more. Severus opened his eyes slowly to look into hers before she finished bringing her lips to his, worrying her tongue between them to gain entrance. With her body against his, she felt him stiffen for a moment before he allowed her in. She was luxuriating in the feel of his mouth that she had missed so much. Lily was also trying to think. It was hard because she knew what she wanted to do, but was trying to remember what she believed would drive Severus to insist they stop. For now, his hands were still on her. One resting on her head, but not holding her mouth to his. The other was still on her arm, and also resting loosely.

She didn't want to argue with him. Snogging was so brilliant. Lily could ask him to try something new before he escaped to the dungeons.

All too soon for Lily, Severus slid his hand from Lily's head, giving her shoulder a nudge to signal they should stop. She did a quick check on the time, before taking his hand and guiding it to her chest. "Touch me here, Sev."

Severus let Lily place his hand where she wanted it. He cooperated by sliding his hand along the side and then gently weighing her breast in the palm of his hand. With her school sweater, over her blouse and then her undergarments, he wasn't sure what she expected to feel. Severus looked her in the face. There was no look of rapture that the witches in Mulciber's photos faked, but they were naked, at least from the waist up. That had to be closer to what normal people did because he had only noticed his father treat his mother's like handles when he took her from behind. For the most part, his mother stayed dressed.

"This might be better with bare skin," he suggested. Severus lifted his hand upwards onto the front and then rubbed his thumb around. "I'm not feeling where it is through your uniform."

Lily hesitated. It was unusual for Severus to suggest going further, and she knew undressed was crossing the line. Was he asking permission to put his hand inside her shirt? Once they started something like that, Lily would not want to return to Gryffindor. She started to say, "Well ..."

However, Severus had only begun with his thumb caressing her. He let it slide a little higher, and then lightly pinched her nipple between his thumb and forefinger. They both knew he found the spot when Lily gasped in surprise. Severus did not let go, but pulled it forward a bit and gave it a slight twist. A jolt went through Lily's body. He tortured her further by digging his other fingers of that hand into her flesh, and then rolling her soft anatomy in his hand while still maintaining his hold on her nub. She shuddered at the sensations. This was a good kind of pain? Not pain, it should be uncomfortable, but oh …

He was pleased as Lily's body began to shake, her mouth dropped open and her gasp shuddered slowly from her. Taking advantage of all her senses focused on his one hand, he slid his other under her skirt and only needed to stroke her knickers a few times before her whole body bucked against his and she screamed his first name, as she did in the Hog's Head. Denying Lily for a month may have paid off. Severus would not be ignored, nor would he be taken for granted.

The way her muscles kept spasming after Severus surprised her felt oddly pleasant. He had released his grip on her chest as her cry of 'Severus' erupted from her. His hands were now stroking her outer thighs, and did not go higher than where her skirt's hem was, pushed up midway between her knees and waist. How did he know where to touch her? Not just down there, but the way he just fondled her breast was magnificent.

Severus kissed Lily's earlobe, then took it between his lips and gently nipped it.

"No more, Sev," she protested weakly.

"Mmm," he moaned in her ear, stirring feelings deep in her body. "I suppose we should be going then."

"Yes," was the only word that Lily could get out. When did this get so out of control?

"Did you want to meet when breakfast begins tomorrow? It'll give you an excuse to go to sleep early tonight, if you want."

Sleep? How could she sleep now? Rather than giving Severus the satisfaction of knowing he had totally unhinged her, she agreed, "Sure." There. Her voice was steady, and now all she had to do was try to stand up without falling on her face.

Lily allowed Severus to give her a steadying hand as she slid off the window sill. She found she could both stand and walk. Talking? Uh, what would she say? She should say something before Severus took the stairs down.

He said, "Good night."

"Uh, Sev … I enjoyed spending the evening with you."

Nodding, he replied, "Me too, Lily."

Without time to dillydally, Lily tried to move as fast as her thoughts now that her brain was thawing out. Being this was the second time Severus did such a thing to her, this time she wasn't as shocked. Maybe the mead made her a bit crazed last time. However, this sort of thing was going to have to be better controlled than him just deciding to do it on his own. Lily's face wouldn't be green forever, hiding how hot and flushed her skin felt. And what was that he did to her jubblies. Where'd … how'd … ah, Merlin, even when Severus touched her hair it felt good, but when he touched her bosom, at first it seemed a disappointment, then it was like he lit a fire low in the pit of her stomach.

Crossing through the common room, Lily tried to act normal. As soon as she was no longer green, she wouldn't let Severus do that sort of thing so close to curfew. Climbing the stairs, she rationalized that he could not have planned it because she started snogging and then put his hand on her chest. Severus seemed fine with sitting in the window holding her. He didn't reveal anything with what he said, and Lily became so distracted she had no idea if there was any change to his body. She had totally ignored him, exactly what she was advised not to do. Not that she was going to follow that advice since no one knew Severus like her, but the part about taking him for granted … she'd have to do something about that. Lily had been thinking about that before the werewolf, who she had trouble thinking of as Lupin, so it wasn't this darned life debt thing.

Severus had said she didn't need to worry about it. If it needed to occur, it would just happen. That was the problem! Lily didn't want something just to happen, she wanted to decide what, where and when. Her best friend needed help with many things, and Lily was sure she could pay off this debt thing, if she put her mind to it but that wasn't how it worked. Stupid wizards and life debts. Another thing she'd have to research. And another thing she could blame on that murdering toerag, Sirius Black. He deserved to be in prison for ruining so many people's lives and getting Helen killed.

By the time Lily was finished with her bath and had returned to her room in her pajamas, her thoughts had strayed back to Severus. He was her best friend and continued to prove it. Without Helen and Mary by her side, the loneliness up here in the Tower magnified how much she missed him. Her girlfriends were fun in ways that Severus was not, and that had to be why she had not missed him while he was down in the dungeons. Perhaps Sev was right, and another Gryffindor girl would move in with her. Would McGonagall pick someone or look for a volunteer? What if they didn't click?

*******************************

Mrs. Apolline Black. Her name itself spoke of beauty, refinement and charm, and she was all his. If she wasn't so perfect, Sirius would think the best thing about marrying at seventeen was moving far away from his idiot parents and all their blathering on about a new start, don't waste his second chance, and what it cost them to arrange this. He'd tell them to shove it up their arse, but no price was too high for Apolline.

They already had a townhouse in France, Paris, the center of culture. Of course, Paris would need to wait until they returned from their honeymoon. Va Va Voom.

Everything could wait till then. Apolline already started teaching him French. Sirius was a quick study and already learned all the important words * wink wink *, and reciprocated by showing Apolline a few of his secret moves.

The French Ministry wasn't as oppressive as the British one, especially with his new father-in-law being so highly placed. So he'd learn apparition from a frenchie, big deal. He'd probably pick it up in no time.

For now, they would be traveling first class or via portkey, and travel they would.

*******************************

On Saturday, Lily had been worried, but Severus seemed content to spend all day in the library with her. Between the library closing and curfew, they returned to the window, but this time Lily controlled herself and Severus held her, as he originally had the evening before. By the time Lily was back in the Tower, she was positive Severus was trying to drive her mad.

By Sunday breakfast, Lily thought she had a perfect plan in mind since both of them were done with their homework. She forgot all about it while reading her copy of The Sunday Prophet. Lily spluttered at the smiling and kissing photo of Sirius Black and his new bride who he married in France, of all places. What in the name of all that was holy was going on?

Lily studied the words beneath the picture trying to unravel what had to be some sort of prank in the poorest of taste. By the fifth read through, she was whispering them aloud slowly to comprehend what appeared to be a legitimate wedding announcement. It couldn't be.

Stunned, Lily looked around the Great Hall. It was still early, but Lily had dawdled waiting for her newspaper. Unlike muggle Sunday papers, the Prophet was not a heavier and many times thicker on Sundays. Hadn't anyone noticed this photo? Lily couldn't be the only one who looked on the announcement page looking for students she knew that had graduated before her.

Severus didn't get the paper, but Lily didn't want to run over to the Slytherin table and be the one to bring it to his attention. Plenty of Slytherins got the paper, and could say something. Lily bit her lower lip. If there was someone who was the epitome of immaturity, it was Sirius Black. If people thought that berk was old enough to marry ... well, there was something wrong with them. Severus and Lily were not old enough, and had too much to do before they did such a thing. Black was probably a fugitive and had no desire to work, study or do much of anything except hear himself talk.

Slowly the noise in the Great Hall grew as the photo was found and shown to anyone that did not receive the paper. For the most part, Hufflepuffs and Ravenclaws were aghast at how easily Sirius Black just slipped out of the country and apparently started a new life without consequence. The female Gryffindors understood that, but their outrage along with the volume was unparalleled since the Ashwinder incident during the holiday pantomime years ago. Slytherins quietly discussed what could possibly happen next. They knew this was not the end of it. Only murdering idiots publicly wiped their noses on their victims and openly declared where they would be hiding out. The Gryffindor boys were quiet. Getting their quidditch captain killed and maiming others was not good fun. No one accidentally uses a werewolf as a prank. And now … well now, their hero was chickening out, marrying some foreigner and going to live in France. Gryffindors don't run. And they certainly don't hide behind the snail-eating French.

*******************************

Remus was still dazed and hoping that at any moment he would wake to find out that this was a horrible nightmare. When his parents brought a copy of the paper, he sat in open-mouthed shock. To be part of his nightmare, there would have to be some niggling thought in his subconscious. First off, out of the four of them, Sirius was the least likely to marry and proud of it. He also frequently declared his disdain for anything foreign. He didn't even like cuisine, other than British. Very meat and potatoes, or fish and chips.

He had been used and abandoned. Turned into a killer for another's enjoyment. Deceived and discarded. So many negative words came to Remus' mind to describe his situation. He was young and reckless, and now he was truly screwed.

*******************************

James only thought one thing when he saw the paper – what a brilliant prank! Sirius must have gotten someone at the Prophet to insert this into one copy and ensure its delivery to the Potters'.

Sirius Black would be single long after James' grandchildren were being born.

AN: I like escargot. Fictionally, I was trying to create the impression that the young British wizards consider themselves superior to French wizards. This was not a statement of fact :^) and it will be settled on a quidditch pitch.

Just a reminder that Fleur's mother would be half-veela so Sirius is now OOC because he doesn't have the inclination to think about anything other than pleasing his woman.


	31. Chapter 31 No Joke

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 31 No Joke

James was going crazy. He had been on owl lock down since he was suspended because his parents thought he might do something stupid. His parents were treating him like some sort of stranger in their house, and now that Sirius was really married … maybe … James was frantic. Sirius was not answering his mirror. It was dark every time James tried, which was every chance he got. He was carrying it around the house with him since his parents wouldn't leave him alone in his room. All James was doing was listening to the wireless. Merlin!

Couldn't fly. Couldn't owl. Couldn't talk through the floo. Had a house elf popping up on him when he was trying to enjoy some alone time in the bath. Might as well say James was a prisoner in his own house.

_******************************************_

Since Severus was wearing his school uniform to Helen's memorial, Lily decided to do the same. They would be flooing with Prof. McGonagall.

She had heard some grumbling in Gryffindor house about the family not agreeing to have the main ceremony at Hogwart's. Lily could understand the decision, even if she wasn't in complete agreement. Helen died here. She also had many in her house turned against the idea of her being quidditch captain.

They were under dressed, compared to the others in their dark dress robes. However, their uniforms had the black robes so they did not stand out, in Lily's opinion. If she had found the green that Severus suggested at the end of August, they may have been too bright.

This home was quite large. Lily was not sure if this was Helen's house, or a relative's. She knew from Helen that she had a large family. It was impractical to visit her roommates over the summer, since they lived remotely. Lily did not have a floo, and they did not live near a train station or within a decent driving distance.

Her normally inquisitive nature was muted due to the occasion of her visit, as they were shown to a large room enclosed with glass. Severus shrugged at her whispered questions. Lily frowned. Another mystery about Severus. Even if he never mentioned his wizarding grandparents, surely he had a pair of them that he either remembered or were about somewhere? Lily's had unfortunately passed either before she was born, or sometime since then. Petunia had clearer memories of them.

She hissed at him while McGonagall was talking to some former students, "Where do your mother's parents live?"

"I don't know."

"Are your father's parents around?"

"No, that's who our house came from."

Lily sat where they were told, now understanding why Sev's house was never modernized. She couldn't imagine buying one in the 1950s or 1960s without an indoor bathroom. There were things one desired in a house, but others were absolute necessities.

They were on the side, towards the back so Lily could see a lot of the other guests. She recognized Frank Longbottom with a couple that might be his parents. Wilkes and Rosier arrived with their parents and sat closer to the front. Not knowing if there was an etiquette, Lily refrained from waving until they did something.

When Mary arrived with her parents, she captured Lily's full attention. Although this only happened last week, she looked fragile and pale in her all-black robes. The sleeves were long so Lily could not make out how the loss of her hand looked from this distance. Prof. McGonagall joined them and all four of them sat down and continued talking in hushed tones. Lily could not tell anything from the backs of their heads.

She whispered, "Have you ever been to one of these?"

"No."

Lily went quiet as she observed what others were doing and trying to figure out who people could be. A fellow that may be a Parkin by marriage had a small group join him. He was wearing black pin-striped robes. Lily wouldn't have thought that would look well, but this man certainly gave them an air of importance. It may have helped that his hair was precisely parted down the middle above a shrewd looking face. She didn't care for the mustache. It accentuated his down turned mouth too much.

Then the headmaster arrived. There was a ripple as the people parted to let him through, but many that he passed took up whispering as they kept their eyes on him, besides gesturing in his wake. Lily suspected that they might think like her and think his negligence had a hand in Helen's death. It was not in the paper at all, but if that lazy reporter couldn't be bothered to mention Sirius Black, he certainly wasn't going to go looking any deeper.

Although there were more than enough empty seats around them to give those present some space to grieve in their own way, a blond woman in a fashionable dark gray robe sat directly behind Severus. Even with her wire glasses, Lily thought she was trying to look a little Marilyn Monroe with the way her hair was waved and turned under just so in the back. Whoever she was, she caught Lily looking back at her and returned a slight smile along with a quirk of her eyebrow.

Everyone got seated and things got underway. Lily didn't know what to expect, but she anticipated something a bit more … magical, other than enlarged photographs of Helen and some unusual flower arrangements. She didn't remember much about funeral services she went to before she even started Hogwart's, but the sensational, dramatic ones on telly eclipsed this affair.

Overall, Lily couldn't say she was disappointed, since everything was calm and sedate, other than outbursts of tears. Some of the things that were said got Lily a bit choked up too. No one wants an exciting funeral. Or at least not normal sorts of people.

To be truthful, Severus did not want to be here. Lily wanted to be here. So here he was, sitting with her in the back. At least she stopped asking him questions about wizarding houses. What wizard was going to willingly invite him into their house? Why couldn't Lily be bothered to think before she made her inane inquiries. At times he was convinced she couldn't bear not to hear herself talk. Silence bothered Lily, even at a memorial service for one of her best friends. Unbelievable.

Her questions about his family were not unexpected since he knew how much Lily valued her family, though her timing was debatable. Severus did not have much to say since he did not know anything, other than his father's parents were muggles and lived in Spinner's End. His mother did not talk about hers. Her tales of the wizarding world were about how wonderful Hogwart's was. Severus did not like thinking of his mother as a liar, so was willing to accept that she enjoyed being a student.

He didn't like whoever it was sitting behind him, but Lily would only get miffed if he asked her to move with him. There were plenty of seats, so he strongly suspected she did it on purpose.

Eventually, all the speech making stopped. Severus had sunk into quite a foul mood. If he was dead, as Black planned, no one would say a fraction of this stuff about him. It was more likely that no one would notice he was even missing, except Lily, if he didn't come back from the Shrieking Shack. With the way she thought, she'd probably think he decided to run off without even saying good-bye to her. His mind had already wandered down the dark path that Lily would probably prefer him gone, over the loss of her girlfriends. His depth of feeling for Lily was incomparable to their shallow camaraderie. However, she certainly preferred their company over his for her first five years at Hogwart's.

Lily noticed that Severus had tilted his head forward during the eulogy allowing his hair to cover his face. She hadn't expected him to be emotional over Helen, but anyone's death at such a young age was a tragedy. It was rather presumptuous of Lily to overlook that Severus has feelings too. He was the one who handled her body so it was not left behind for the werewolf, or Lupin, to continue consuming. She swallowed as she recalled. That took a bravery Lily did not possess, she thought, while she put her hand over his that was resting on his leg.

There was lengthened silence as all sat respectfully in contemplation. Lily did not see any signal, but simultaneously about half the group stood and starting forming small groups of conversation again. Around her, Severus was unmoving, and the blonde woman behind him was trying to sneak a glance at herself in her compact mirror.

Lily stood, hoping that Severus would follow without her pulling him along. She wanted to talk to Mary. He still did not move and Lily nudged him with her knee. Severus looked up at her questioningly. "I'd like to go towards the front, Sev."

He nodded and stood. If Lily's conversation partners bored him, Severus could always examine the photos, letters from Parkin and flowers to pass the time.

Lily put her hand on his shoulder, "Sit back down. Mary's mother just pointed over here. We'll stay back here for them, so Mary does not get stared at."

While he resumed his seat, Severus had to control expressing what he thought aloud. If someone wanted to lay low in this room, she wouldn't head over to the only two green people.

Prof. McGonagall and the MacDonalds came over. Lily resisted the impulse to stare at Mary's right wrist and focused on her face. Obviously, she had been crying. Mary hugged Lily when she reached her, and when she unexpectedly tried to embrace Severus, he was able to get his hands up to prevent her from doing it smoothly, and softly growled, "Don't."

"Oh, right. Sorry about that," Mary apologized while turning back to Lily. She said, "Well … we're almost … through this part, huh, Lily?"

"Yes," Lily replied with a nod. She felt Severus stand again behind her. Probably to ease his escape if anyone else tried to touch him.

"You've already met my mother and father before, Lily" Mary said since they had caught up to her. "And this is my friend, Severus Snape," she added to introduce him to her parents.

Mary's father said while extending his hand, "If we had known you had stayed at St. Mungo's, instead of going home like the others, we would have come round."

"That's fine," Severus muttered, keeping behind Lily rather than stepping forward into the group. He'd rather go look at the photos of Parkin, than stand back here among false sentiments.

Mrs. MacDonald studied her daughter's savior. Mary had told her parents a bit about the Slytherin lad. Mary owed a Slytherin a life debt. Her daughter's description of the lanky, unkempt, half-blooded misanthrope recovering from dragonpox was apparently true. She only left out his nose. Clothed, she could not see his heavily scarred backside that Mary explained colored his dealings with other people, other than his one friend, Lily Evans from Gryffindor. Mary explained she knew about that from lads thinking it hilarious to strip this defaced fellow of all his clothes, and her short courtship with Malcolm Wilkes, who roomed with him.

She had just been telling Prof. McGonagall that Gryffindor house was nothing like when they were girls at school. Although she dreaded the investigation by the Board of Governors, she was dearly looking forward to it. Something was very wrong at Hogwart's. Slytherins saving Gryffindors. She could only thank Merlin this boy didn't run out of there when he saw that werewolf.

Mary was telling Lily, "Prof. McGonagall is trying to convince me to come back to school. I can hardly cast anything with my other hand."

"You're bound to improve," Lily encouraged, now realizing why there was still a second bed in her room.

"And there's … uh, being a werewolf."

"Severus has been giving that a lot of thought. We've been doing research."

"You have?" Mary asked, looked past Lily to Severus. Lily elbowed him.

He shrugged, "Evans' parents would be ill-prepared, so it won't go to waste." Lily would at the very least want to keep her family safe. He doubted Hogwart's staff would listen to his ideas.

"Like what?"

"It wouldn't be a long-term solution, but a cage is effective. Trapped werewolves turn their rage on themselves, so some distractions would have to be devised. Not just throwing in large hunks of flesh, like we read in one account, but something more amusing that would not be detrimental when reverting back to witches.

"Add a person to both watch and supervise with their own safety cage that they could retreat to, in case. Alarm charms and charms to detect the werewolf outside of its allowed area to seal the room.

"Once there's a rapport or what captures their attention best, maybe give them a little more room to move around. Perhaps an outside caged area, since they have that in their nature. Not at school, but on private land, where someone won't disturb them."

"Sev means something a bit more durable than dog toys to keep them, or us, occupied," Lily added. "We needed some time in a muggle pet shop where they have a large selection for us to get ideas. They like things to chew on, thrown toys, and maybe rope?"

"Werewolves aren't pets."

"It would be hard on whoever is guarding to watch the self-injury. I thought it would be worth a try," Severus defended. "At Hogwart's, house elves may even be used as additional security. They are bound to protect the school and students. In one firsthand account we read, they were the only guards used. Unfortunately, the author did not include what they did while he was changed. As his elves, they would be committed to not allowing self-harm."

During Severus' unusually long speech, for anyone but Lily, the adults around them had gone quiet.

Prof. McGonagall asked, "Where in the school would you propose this, Mr. Snape?"

Scowling at her humoring him, he answered, "There's a few areas in the dungeons with long corridors. Seal one of them with multiple metal doors and stone. Werewolves cannot use passwords. Ghosts could also pass there, if the house elves and alarm charms aren't sufficient."

Since the headmaster had not told her yet of what he had in mind, especially for Lily Evans, who could not be expected to go home, Prof. McGonagall was naturally concerned. Snape considered safety in addition to amusing a werewolf to keep it from turning on itself. Considering he had also met Lupin as a werewolf, he was definitely thinking on the cautious side with cages, sealed corridors, and human, house elf and possibly ghost guards. If Dumbledore's weren't up to scratch, at the very least Evans had her and her friend to correct things before another disaster occurred.

"We'd like to inspect that sort of arrangement," Mr. MacDonald said, looking at McGonagall. He wasn't going to let his daughter finish at Hogwart's, if they were just as careless with her. Her education was not worth the risk of Azkaban. NEWTs be damned. He may even insist on being at the school those nights to help keep an eye on things. No idiot was going to set his little girl loose on others.

Prof. McGonagall steered Mary's parents away from the students to discuss the possibility of Mary returning to finish her schooling. Mary shrugged at Lily and said, "I'd better tag along before they agree to something totally embarrassing."

"I'll write you," Lily replied.

"At least you know they won't chuck you out, if you are infected," Severus murmured.

"That wouldn't be right, Sev. It's only a year and a half more, and if they had, I might be able to study up on my own and still sit the exams."

"Perhaps. The one that might be tricky is apparition. If you aren't allowed to apparate outside of a Ministry class, without a license, there's no other option."

"Apparating's the least of our worries."

"It's important. Especially for us without our homes on the floo network. If they," Severus said with a jerk of his head at the MacDonalds and McGonagall, "wanted to be helpful. They could have offered to either let your parents personally know you were in an accident and alright, or even side-along your mother or father down to St. Mungo's."

"Are they allowed to do that?"

"It's not a secret to your parents that you are a witch. If you are hurt at school, they should make an effort to set things right."

Lily knew that Severus was oversimplifying how easy it would be. Wizards could not apparate with muggles, and there was probably a very good reason for it. Rather than being drawn into one of his clever arguments, she asked, "Can your mum apparate?"

"She probably has a license. I've never seen her do it. Where would she go?"

Lily made a face at him. How about taking a younger Severus far away from Tobias Snape? Starting over with nothing might even be a step up from that house in Spinner's End. Lily would never stay with someone like that. Although her mother had told her not to be judgmental about what went on over at the Snapes', it was hard not to.

"Snape. Evans," greeted Frank Longbottom. Lily glanced past him to his parents. His mum didn't look terrifying at all.

Severus shifted to avoid Longbottom fully putting his arm around him. There was contact. He glared darkly at Longbottom, who had adopted his fiancé's touchy-feely Hufflepuff ways. The dunderhead smiled at him.

"My parents," he introduced, then indicated, "Lily Evans from Gryffindor, and Severus Snape from Slytherin. Sixth years."

Severus allowed Lily to shift in front of him. She adored meeting new people. He may be able to get away with just nodding when appropriate. Lily was able to carry the conversation for both of them about school, the werewolf incident and dragonpox. It was rather boring. At least to Severus, even when Lily exaggerated by saying he had saved her. He only cast a spell before she did, that's all. If Lily wanted to think he saved her, than he could live with it if she'd only expressed it to him with more than just this carnal connection she sought. Severus knew what was between Lily and him transcended a physical attraction. It was certainly obvious to him because he was not the slightest bit physically attractive. Lily listening to him and attempting to understand his point of view would be a vast improvement in their relationship.

He was paying attention to the conversation. He hadn't known Oakby was also in auror training. Once Longbottom got past the tedious details about that, he talked about Oakby and him getting married. Severus watched Lily's face to see what plans pleased her most. It was futile to wait for everything to be perfect, and Severus had never even experienced ideal. His life was good when things were barely adequate. He wanted it better for Lily. Would she take the easy way and marry some wealthy git who would never love her the way he did? Until they were married, there was always the chance she'd decide on someone else. Then he'd have no one. The life debt was no help to him if Lily decided it was in his best interest to be better off without her, and left alone.

Thinking about such things left him in surly when he noticed that blond woman from earlier was looking at him, and then he was almost certain she winked. She must be looking at someone behind them. Why would some attractive stranger wink at him? Strangers yelled insults at Severus, they did not wink. He wasn't even dressed posh for her to mistake him for someone else. A Slytherin uniform didn't necessarily mean rich parents. Some just squeaked along on family tradition in a disrepaired home.

Eventually the Longbottoms and Lily ran out of things to discuss, even the weather of all things. They drifted away, and that woman that Severus had turned away from, but continued to watch from the corner of his eye moved closer. He looked towards McGonagall, but she was talking to some of the Parkins. Dumbledore was surrounded by some old duffers, all smiling and carrying on. It was surprising that Slughorn wasn't in the midst of them. If there was a buffet, he'd have been here with bells on.

That lady must have been winking at him because now she was right next to Lily and Severus, smiling. "I wanted to come over and introduce myself. I'm Rita Skeeter," she said while extending her hand.

Lily accepted it, and replied, "I'm Lily Evans, and this is Severus Snape."

Severus remained silent while studying the witch. What did she want?

"I guessed as much. I'm a reporter and author. You may have read my book, Armando Dippet: Master or Moron?, and my work has appeared in both the Prophet and Witch Weekly. Horrible what happened to the group of you at school. Such a shame. Ever since I wrote about the former headmaster and his eccentricities, I have been keeping my eyes and ears open for further endangerment to today's young witches and wizards."

Enchanted to at last meet someone who could be of assistance, Lily responded, "It is a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Skeeter."

There was a pause in the conversation. If Skeeter was waiting for Severus to say he was pleased, she may never talk again, he thought smugly. There was something about her that he didn't like. It might be that whatever she had in mind could get Lily and him in a lot of trouble. If the school decided tomorrow that there would be no werewolves in attendance, Lily could get booted out. Severus could live with people being unhappy with him, but did not want that for Lily.

"I read Barnabas Cuffe's work on it, and I did a little digging. I can be of help to expose what really happened. The public wants to know."

"You could?" Lily asked.

"Oh, believe me, I know what kind of people you are facing. I went to school with Bellatrix Black, Sirius' cousin. That whole family is composed of sadistic maniacs. Wealthy maniacs with solicitors and the ears of the Ministry. To run off to France and marry a relative of one of their high government officials, when our Ministry should have had him locked in a cell, is an outrage."

"I agree," Lily concurred.

Severus was also appalled at how easily Sirius Black got out of trouble. It was one thing to have the Gryffindor-friendly headmaster patting Black on the head, but how is murder punished by forcing him to marry an attractive French girl? That photo in the paper didn't appear non consensual.

"Perhaps we can go in the corner for a quick interview?"

Severus interrupted, "At a memorial service?" He needed to talk to Lily prior to them doing any talking. She didn't think first.

Chastened by the thought that she was about to agree, even though this would help Helen and her memory, Lily confirmed, "Now's not the time."

"Can I arrange to visit you two at school?"

As Lily agreed with "Sure," Severus said, "We'll have to discuss it."

Why was Severus reluctant? Lily asked herself. Surely, he wanted Sirius Black to get his comeuppance, and everyone that was covering up his crimes.

"I'll set something up with Prof. Slughorn," Skeeter said, ignoring Severus' hesitance.

"Yes, uh, we'll let you know," Lily responded, finally suspecting that Severus knew something she didn't. She would have thought it more proper to talk to Prof. McGonagall since she was their chaperone today.

Once they were alone, Lily steered her friend towards an unoccupied bit of wall in the back. "What's her story?"

"I don't know her, but if she has a bone to pick with Bellatrix Black, it would be suicidal for the two of us to be drawn into it."

"Who's she?"

"Almost definitely a Death Eater. I've heard her name a lot."

"What does she have to do with Sirius?"

"I'm not sure. Regulus seems to be a the favorite son, but I can't be sure. He's pompous and arrogant like his brother, but whatever jinxing him and his buddy, Crouch Jr., do they keep to themselves."

"Maybe they don't jinx anyone, Sev."

"If they don't, they think about it frequently. They whisper, grin and giggle too much not to be up to something. Taking on the Black family as a whole is not in our best interest. Also, we need to be careful in case Hogwart's decides to reverse its decision regarding werewolves, at least until we know your status."

"But that wouldn't be fair. And it's going to be a lot safer, with Prof. McGonagall, you and others knowing I might be a werewolf."

"Fair has nothing to do with it. Us coming across an unguarded werewolf was an embarrassment to the school. Putting you and MacDonald in the same place for something to go wrong might be a ploy to get rid of the two living victims."

"Severus, stop talking like that."

"I don't mean McGonagall. She doesn't strike me as someone who would take part in that, she's a bit like you. However she can be misdirected, misled and not present if something were to go wrong."

Lily frowned. He was so paranoid sometimes. It was their duty to do what was right. They owed it to Helen and her memory. Helen would have if something happened to Lily.

_******************************************_

Bellatrix couldn't help roll her eyes at Uncle Orion grasping at straws for the Dark Lord's favor. Her father, Cygnus, may think of his cousin like a brother, considering they were born merely days apart, but when it came to service to their Lord, her branch of the Black family was the one he favored. Both herself and her father had been marked for his service, and were honored to be Death Eaters.

Until Orion was ready to make the same commitment as her, he was just wasting his breath. Besides, her little cousin, Sirius, was mentally impaired.

If her father wasn't here, Bella would say exactly what she thought about little pretty boy Sirius. The empty-headed idiot was not acting on his father's suggestion to cause chaos at Hogwart's and be a pain in Dumbledore's backside. Dumbledore didn't care about Hogwart's and the students. He was headmaster when she was there, and used it as his distant lair to keep out of sight of the prying Ministry. Wizards couldn't just come and go from Hogwart's. How many times had the Dark Lord lamented he couldn't just walk up to the front door and deal with that muggle-loving fool once and for all? Albus Dumbledore was an old, decrepit coward.

Voldemort sat, stroking his smooth chin while Orion Black attempted to curry his favor. A blow to Dumbledore's reputation? The man was an outdated nitwit, whose power lie with those who rallied around him.

He remembered as a teen when Dumbledore beat Grindelwald, a fraction of the wizard that Voldemort had made himself. It was an absolute circus with him and Slughorn abandoning the school and the students to ride a atop of wave of ceremonies and parties. One they had never gotten off of. Let him continue with his galas, while Voldemort drew the true wizards to his side. The wizards of substance.

What concerned him right now was the slowdown of recruits. Many sounded interested, but when the time came to act, all but his absolutely faithful had failed to appear for the past month. There was some new unknown factor influencing the purebloods who should desire a return to the old ways. The ways he promised to restore to them.

_******************************************_

Lily was surprised when she arrived in the Great Hall for dinner, but found the tables removed and chairs set up facing the front of the hall. She stood for a moment, looking around. Severus snuck up behind her, and said, "We can sit together. Dumbledore's got something to say about Parkin before dinner."

"How do you know?"

"Slughorn wanted to make sure we'd all be here. It was on the bulletin board."

"Oh. It may have been on ours. I didn't check."

"You're here anyway."

"Are you allowed to sit over here?"

"Why not? There's no table."

Lily sighed. She had been eating with other Gryffindor girls. They made her feel welcome, but it wasn't the same as Mary and Helen. If she couldn't eat with them, she wished Severus could come sit at their table. Lily didn't want to go over to Slytherin. Besides the Dark Lord fan club, she didn't like the looks some of those young boys gave her. "Do you know if you have to sit with your house for every meal, Sev?"

He shrugged, "I haven't noticed anyone sit down at another table. Besides tradition, I'm sure that it wouldn't be allowed. If it started, someone would abuse it."

"Abuse it?"

"Start trouble in some way. Come over in a group, act like slobs, grab all of one kind of food, or be obnoxious."

Frowning, Lily thought it over. Why did a few people have to ruin it for everyone?

Severus took her hand. He did not want to eat at the Gryffindor table. As they waited quietly, he endured some of the little Gryffs snickering 'Snivellus' and 'Snivelly'. Oh yeah, eating over here would be a real joy. Probably jinx every piece of food he touched too.

Lily bit her tongue. Stupid toerags. If Severus could ignore them, it was best that she heed her own advice about name calling hurt no one.

Eventually, the time came for the assembly to begin. Prof. Slughorn began with Helen's accomplishments, which he was well aware of since she was a member of his Slug Club. Dumbledore was briefer, talking about how her loss was a loss to all of them, and soon Wilkes, Rosier and even MacDonald would be returning to school. McGonagall spoke of MacDonald and Evans, and how no tolerance would be allowed for abysmal disregard for others' safety. She then asked that the students show a moment of silence in order to respect Parkin's memory, and then they clear the hall for the tables to be replaced.

Lily had been numb to it all. For some reason, Slughorn's recitation had caused her to be disinterested. It registered that they expected Mary to return to school. Severus gave her hand a bit of a tug to help her up, and as they left the hall, he muttered, "Ignore them."

Listening, she heard mutters of 'werewolf'.

_******************************************_

Peter was bored to tears at home with his mother. Their house was too small to get away from her. How he wished James would invite him over. The Potters had such a lovely house with lots of room for guests with house elves doing everything for them. Things could be better for the Pettigrews if his father didn't have such high ideals and was happy doing his bit in the Centaur Liaison Office at the Ministry.

With friends like Black and Potter, Peter was going places. He was pleased to see how easily Sirius moved on from getting expelled. With their abilities, it was a waste of time to stay in school and find jobs. They were wizards. Working in an office like a muggle was preposterous. Peter should set himself up with muggles working for him, and then take that worthless muggle money and exchange it into heaps of shiny galleons. He'd buy his mum something nice too, if she played her cards right and stopped nagging him.

He already told her, he didn't do anything wrong. The whole thing got all twisted up, like that mess over the summer. Once he was out of school, he'd register his animagus form and show her who was a successful wizard. It took one really gifted to do that.

Now that Padfoot had a wife in Paris, and Moony was gone, it would just be Prongs and Wormtail. Or perhaps Wormtail and Prongs. Peter had a year and a half to cement his relationship as James' best friend. And now that Evans was one of the werewolf victims, he could forget all about her. Peter still owed her and MacDonald one from that wedgie in the common room. Parkin already got her payback.

_******************************************_

MacDonald would be returning to school. When she did, Severus bet that Lily would no longer have any time for him. He could be nice to Mary MacDonald for Lily's sake. Petunia gave him plenty of practice. However, they would not need to leave Gryffindor tower to keep each other company. Severus could not join Lily there.

He did not think he could live with things going back to the way they were before with Lily ignoring him for the company of her girlfriend. Severus had given a lot of thought to this in the past, but had decided against taking any action. Now though, it was worth rethinking.

Love potions were illegal, and both love and lust potions were either detectable, or suspicious, if it was the kind that came on strongly and wore off quickly. Slipping one to Lily before they took their apparition test at the Ministry and getting married, was a definite reason to have the marriage annulled as invalid. Besides, Severus did not think that Lily needed a lust potion. He was not sure that she only felt that way about him. She might let any bloke that kissed her put his hands on or in her knickers. Lily definitely liked that. He was actually surprised at how easy it was to please her in that way. There were a couple charms that were considered harmless, but somewhat binding.

_******************************************_

Lily had been writing Mary. She was using a dictaquill for now. Mary was not happy with her magical prosthetic hand. She wrote that it was ugly and looked metallic and heavy. It was not cold to the touch, but the sight of it disturbed her.

She would be returning to school at the end of November. Mary visited briefly with her parents to view the area where she would transform. Lily had not been told so didn't see her. Prof. McGonagall gave Lily a tour too. It was rather like what Severus had in mind, down in the dungeons at the end of a long dead end corridor that had been sealed off behind a stone wall. The room itself had a heavy metal door, and there were two cages for herself and Mary, and another barred area at the door for whoever would be supervising them.

When Lily asked about Severus being allowed in the area, at least for the first moon rise, Prof. McGonagall did not think it appropriate, but would see if he could enter during the night to see Lily. She understood that Severus Snape was more than Lily's friend, but Mary MacDonald would also be undressed in the room.

As the full moon got closer, Lily was getting more nervous. Was she going to feel this way each month?

On top of all that, Prof. Slughorn asked her and Severus to stay after class to invite them to tea in the headmaster's office on Saturday. When Severus tried to decline, Slughorn said it wasn't that sort of invitation. Lily wasn't happy with either of them. First off, Sev tried to say 'no' without consulting her. Secondly, if they had no choice but to go, Prof. Slughorn shouldn't have made it sound like an invitation. Lily wanted to go. She'd get a chance to talk to the headmaster. He was always so busy.

They went to the headmaster's office from the library a little before three. Lily could tell Severus was already in a bad mood, rather than giving the headmaster a chance. She'd say something about how her friend's preconceptions kept him from enjoying things, but that would only push him into being relentlessly unpleasant, rather than just disagreeable. Well, she'd just sit next to him, and if she had to she'd … elbow, kick and pinch him.

"Fizzing Whizzbees," Lily announced to the griffin.

The only response Lily got was a snort from behind her. Prefects were supposed to be supplied with the current password. She gave the griffin a dark glare, but it took close to twenty whole seconds before it succumbed and moved aside.

"Right on time," Prof. Dumbledore called down to them.

By the time Lily had stamped up the stairs, she was back to her normal self. She wouldn't set a good example for Severus if she scowled just as darkly at everything in here. Though if Prof. Slughorn kept shoving whole confections into his mouth like that without chewing, she might make an exception.

"Thank you for inviting us to tea, Prof. Dumbledore," she replied, while pausing to allow Severus to walk past her to take a seat. The squashy chairs arranged around the table were more like small love seats, so she joined Severus saying, "Budge up, Sev."

He moved to one side. With Lily next to him, she could probably manage talking for him too. She liked that. Severus wasn't in the mood, especially after her hours of instructions on how she wanted him to behave this afternoon.

Slughorn continued with his story, that had been interrupted by the arrival of the students, while Dumbledore started shoveling sugar into a fresh cup of tea. That annoyed Lily. Hosts and hostesses were supposed to serve their guests before themselves.

When the headmaster put the cup in front of her, Lily corrected him, "I only take one sugar, sir. Severus is none."

"None?" Albus repeated. Who drank tea with no sugar? How could it even be called tea?

"None," Severus said with a bit of a smirk, getting a small measure of enjoyment from Lily starting to set the rules. What would she say when she took a good look at the mountain of offered sweets?

"Oh well," Albus replied, vanishing the sugary tea as he took the cup back to prepare tea. One spoon of sugar was hard, but resisting putting any sugar in the second was worse. "Milk?"

"Yes, please. A splash in both," Lily answered. She accepted her tea with a "thank you" and also thanked the headmaster again when she passed over Severus'.

The expected smile was still on her face as she viewed the offerings. What she really was in the mood for was one of her mother's thinly sliced rare roast beef and prepared horseradish sandwiches, but the lack of any meat, even ham or chicken salad was a disappointment. Damn these werewolf tendencies. Lily would have cursed the meatless selection on Severus, but there was not a single thing here that would appeal to him. Not even a plain scone or crumpet. She had gone through a short phase as a little girl when she would have thought iced cakes and other sweets were the perfect tea, and this magical mountain of dainty treats would have made a lifelong memory, but now, this display was ridiculous.

When she reached forward to pick up a little cake with light green icing, silver sparkles and little pair of baby blue sugared sails adorning the top, Lily did not want to know what Severus' indrawn breath was about, but he leaned behind her and whispered, "Butterfly wings."

What kind of nonsense was he pulling? Lily thought as she placed the cake on her place. Just because he did not enjoy sweet food, didn't mean he had to put weird ideas in her head. She could clearly see the crystallized sugar on the adornment. They were obviously made with some sort of paste, and the dainty dots on them barely resembled butterfly wings. She took a plain looking cookie also, before plucking one of the 'wings' off the cake and laying it on her tongue. It took a couple heartbeats for her to move it around her mouth and the sugar coating to dissolve. The item had a fibrous paper feeling. No. No. How dare Severus trick her into putting this in her mouth. Lily swallowed it and then took a long sip of tea. Butterfly wings? Who would want to eat something that resembled butterfly wings in texture? Lily turned towards Sev and made a face at him. He returned a raised eyebrow and the corner of his mouth quirked slightly before he raised his tea cup and pretended to give Slughorn his full attention.

Lily wondered how often Prof. Slughorn dined or had tea with the headmaster. He sure seemed to have a lot to talk about. How many new letters or floos could he have gotten since the last time they met like this?

Severus was amused that Lily still ate the wing, even after he warned her. He didn't mean it as a childish dare. Didn't Slughorn talk about this dunderhead in Tibet before, or was that some berk in Timbuktu? Why did anyone invite him to anything? He was boring as hell. And this tea wasn't that good. It was flavored with something that gave it a smoky taste and smell. In fact, it kind of reeked. Muggle teas may be plainer to the eye, but they were vastly superior.

As Prof. Slughorn plodded puerilely on with his tales, Lily felt that Severus was right. Tea with the headmaster was not all it was cracked up to be. When he finally paused to sip his tea, Lily suggested, "As interesting as your correspondents are, Prof. Slughorn, may we not discuss other subjects please? For instance, at Helen Parkin's memorial, we made the acquaintance of Rita Skeeter. She had said she would be contacting you, Professor, since we do not know her."

"Ah yes, Miss Skeeter. She did, Miss Evans. I put her in contact with Messrs. Rosier and Wilkes. Thank you."

Lily hollowly repeated, "Messrs. Rosier and Wilkes?"

"Yes, Miss Skeeter wanted to write of the tragedy the incident caused. Since both young gentlemen had their possible betrothals ruined, naturally she felt that would be a good story."

"But Mary MacDonald is still alive. She could always find some other young man, if the Wilkes feel that she does not suit."

"Werewolves rarely have children, and there is a chance that they could be infected from birth. Miss MacDonald will have to revise her expectations, since many families are interested in children and grandchildren."

Lily nodded dumbly taking in that bit of news. She might not be able to have children, and if she did, it could be a werewolf? Looking at Severus, she asked, "Did you know that?"

"Yes," he replied, looking directly into her eyes. "I was concentrating on your safety first, Lily."

"Right." Since they had not discussed children at length, Lily supposed it would occur during that conversation. If she was going to one day marry Severus … well, now that looked more likely if she couldn't have children, and it did not seem to bother him. It may bother him, it was hard for Lily to tell. She remembered that he did agree that children would come later, once they were settled somewhere. Talking about it in front of these two was not the place nor time.

Prof. Dumbledore interjected, "I'm sure it will be a fascinating read. Miss Skeeter has such a way with words. Isn't that right, Prof. Dippet?" he asked a portrait.

"Never heard of her," was the sleepy reply.

Albus nodded, "If only she was old enough to write his biography while he was alive. There surely would have been some sparks then."

"I think she'd do better to try her hand at fiction," Horace commented between bites. "Even when she writes something serious, she always tries to cast a fellow as either a hero or a villain. That's not always the true way of things."

Lily leaned back into Severus' arm that had crept up behind her, while the two professors discussed Rita Skeeter and her literary merit. She was naturally disappointed that this opportunity to reveal the truth had slipped by, but she had faith that Malcolm and Evan wouldn't disappoint. Unlike her, they didn't need to worry about being chucked out of school for being a werewolf. Lily also did not want Severus worrying unnecessarily about the Black family or Death Eaters.

Albus ended Horace's critique of today's wizarding literary greats, many of whom he knew personally, by asking, "Prof. Abstractus mentioned that he sent some of your summer arithmancy work to the States for review by a Potions master he's acquainted with, Mr. Snape. How's that coming?"

"The distance makes communication slow, Professor. The hypothetical work needs experimentation so that will take time to discover whether any of it is useful," Severus replied lowly while looking at his cup of tea on the table. He had more important things to think of, like Lily.

The last time Lily had heard something about that mountain of paper Sev produced during August was that even though the Arithmancy professor was pleased with it, he had faced problems getting cooperation from the school, especially Prof. Slughorn, since it was a cross-disciplinary effort because his equations applied to Potions.

"Nothing will come of it. The potions education over there is dreadfully archaic," Horace mentioned while eying the cream filling he was squeezing out of a stuffed cake.

Both Lily and Severus were thinking along similar lines that at least they'd read it, and check to see if it was possible before dismissing it as rubbish.

"I understood that the initial arithmancy was sound, proving the known substitutions, Horace."

"Known, but little used, Albus."

"Wouldn't the principle be the same to find others?"

"Too many factors and variables.'

Severus interjected, "Unlikely ones were ruled out but listed. Any substance can be made to fit the numerical equivalent, but the intrinsic nature of the material is key. Much like using different incantations to produce the same spell. Prior to Latin becoming the dominant wizarding language, Egyptians, Chinese, Babylonians and Persians were all able to incant in their own tongue. Even the Celtic and Gaelic methods mostly ignore Latin."

"They gibbered and chanted for hours to achieve what we can cast with a simple phrase," Horace said dismissively. Sometimes these whelps were overeducated to the point they just spouted nonsense.

"Not hours. It simply takes more concentration and investment of the wizard's power and focus. I closed MacDonald's wounds using a druidic method. The tourniquet was the standard spell, but for wound closure the variability of chanting charms is more elegant."

Albus answered, "That is true. The freedom of that type of spellwork allows for varied results. Of course, it takes maintaining eye contact and focus. Most wizards would rather not be bothered since they have so much on their minds and are constantly rushed. Transfiguration is similar. While all the students are using the same incantation and wand movement, the results vary depending on the caster's desire and concentration."

"What class is this other type of magic taught in?" Lily asked.

"Ancient Runes touches upon it, Miss Evans. The principle is not taught because it could result in such varying degrees of use and complexity. Some older fields of magic, such as the dark arts, borrow heavily from those methods since new spells are not publicly researched and published. Any new spell is usually lost within a generation or two, unless it is a widely known one that's been around for centuries, such as the killing curse."

"The killing curse is not a long chant," Lily contradicted.

"Ah, but the basis of the spell is. There must be concrete intent with that spell. That's where the line blurs. It's incantation has been shortened for simplicity over the years and that's why the will of the caster needs to be so intense. Note there is no wand movement necessary for that spell, other than pointing at the target. Many of the old ways of casting did not rely heavily on a wand or even a staff. Once again, an improvement for the modern wizard to cast spells more efficiently with a focusing tool. In ancient times, staring into flames could be used, but that was immensely more difficult since the caster was to lose himself in the flames while concentrating without sight on something else."

As time went on, a few things became apparent to Lily. There was a great deal that was not taught at Hogwart's, and most wizards and witches couldn't be bothered.. Somehow, Severus was learning it or at least knew of it. Lily was suspicious when Prof. Dumbledore mentioned the Dark Arts because her friend was compelled to look into them. However, if they were still known to a select few, weren't most of the wizards in danger because they didn't understand or even know what else was possible? She had noticed that Severus mostly used his knowledge to adapt other spells, rather than raining down death and destruction, as she supposed all dark wizards and Death Eater types did for fun. He rarely did a long incantation, since most of the time his casting was nonverbal.

Bored with the discussion, Horace muttered, "That's all academic, Albus."

Severus thought that was a odd thing for a teacher to complain of in a school. Academics? When there were important things like sweets, parties and pranks? Hoggy Warty Hogwarts was known for its nonstop jolly good time. That's probably why He Who Must Not Be Named didn't bother with it, or his followers would slip into their silk pajamas and join the giant slumber party in the dungeons. Most of the place was pointless. If Severus could take his NEWTs tomorrow, he'd be out of here and urge Lily to do the same. It was clear to him that she didn't enjoy it here any more either.

Albus noted even more contradictions between these students. One male, Slytherin, unpopular and with a natural born grasp of magic and its workings. The other female, Gryffindor, popular and although one of the brightest students at the school, she only knew what she had been taught so far. They shared their friendship, a dislike of the school, and a marked dislike for Horace. Albus saw her dislike stemmed from some sort of repeated mistreatment of her friend. He couldn't get much out of the boy emotionally towards Horace or him, but the girl put a lot of blame in general on his shoulders since he was the headmaster. To boot, she did not think well of the tea. Miss Evans barely touched anything, and this time, Mr. Snape only took one brief sip of the beverage.

Within the general populace, there are a handful of people who are never pleased. Albus had thought Severus to be afflicted with that malady. However, here was another student that felt Hogwart's was … disappointing? This epic structure brimming with history, tradition and wonder failed to inspire two of the brightest students in the school. How many others felt like this?

Taking advantage of the others' self reflection, Horace began to tell them of one of his old students that had been promoted from his fast-paced career at the Ministry and was now getting his feet wet with the International Confederation of Wizards, and was likely to occupy a seat of his own in that august organization in no time whatsoever.

******************************************

Later, while sitting in one of their Ravenclaw windows with her back against Severus, Lily tentatively asked, "Are you bothered that I might not be able to have children, Sev?"

"If you are a werewolf, Lily, it's something beyond our ability to change. Once we have all your immediate high priority needs in hand, researching possible future consequences is what I had in mind to do next."

"You'd still marry me?"

"Are you proposing to me?"

"No!" Lily exclaimed with a backward thrust of her elbow.

"I was kidding. You are still the only one for me, Lily. It would still be possible to have children in our lives."

"You mean adopt?"

"Oh, I hadn't thought of that. That's certainly a possibility."

"What did you mean then?"

"Well … this is just thinking aloud, I haven't gotten to looking into this … is it the woman transforming that infects the fetus, or are the eggs themselves tainted with the infection? You don't need to be the one carrying the child in your body so that would solve that first problem."

"Where would it be?"

"Uh, didn't you read that book from St. Mungo's? A male's body can be modified with magic. It's done for male couples, so I don't see why it couldn't be performed on me."

"What's done?"

"I think there's a couple different options. One is the natural way wizards get pregnant, and ..."

"Natural?"

"Well, with magic between two wizards when they make love."

"Huh?"

"Where did I lose you?"

"What do two wizards … do?"

"Do? Uh, what do you mean? Like how two members of the same gender can live like uh …. a man and wife? I don't want to offend you, Lily, or get unnecessarily graphic."

Rather than having Severus think she was terribly naive, Lily coyly said, "I just want to hear you say it, Sev."

"What? Um, well they can do everything we've done up to this point. Kiss, hold each other, and then touch wherever they care to pleasure the other. And then there's what you'd probably consider the main sex act, which is rather similar. A male can penetrate another by putting, or rather using the other's bum."

Lily turned her head to make sure Severus didn't see the look on her face. Was he making this up? She didn't think so, since they were having a serious conversation when this came up.

When she said nothing, Severus mentioned, "We could do that too, but you hadn't indicated an interest in that sort of thing."

"But I'm not a boy," she muttered, trying to keep her voice steady.

"Alright. Can we return to talking about children?"

"Sure. So there would be ways that the baby could grow within you, if I'm a werewolf?"

"Yes, and you already know that the impregnation can be caused by a potion. If your eggs are infected, then we could use someone else's. Maybe Petunia?"

"What?"

"She has the same parents as you, so wouldn't hers be closest?"

"I guess that makes sense," Lily replied slowly. "I don't think she would."

"She wouldn't? If she couldn't have a child, wouldn't you do that for her?"

"Of course I would, Sev."

"I see," he replied. It was about time Lily realized that the lengths she was willing to go through for others, didn't mean they'd return the favor.

"I'm sure Petunia would, once it was explained to her."

"So do any of these possibilities reassure you that the general idea that you can't have children, does not mean you wouldn't be a wonderful mother?"

"But why would Mary …?"

"Things are different for others, Lily. I love you, and you alone. I don't consider what my future would be like with others. There is no one who is better than you."

Lily sighed. The issue of children was important to her. Important enough to reopen this topic. She knew Severus loved her, and just his ability to think of ways to overcome what he downplayed to be a minor setback. It was probably ridiculous to think that Malcolm Wilkes and his family would dismiss it as easily. Rather than arguing with him, she replied, "True. So true, Severus."

He kissed her temple. "I know you want more information and guarantees first, Lily, rather than accepting things will happen, whether we want them to or not. I don't want to waste any moment that we could possibly be together."

She sat in silence mulling over 'guarantees'. What kind of promise could protect them from werewolves, Death Eaters and He Who Must Not Be Named, and toerags in general? Lily knew Severus was far from perfect, but wasn't it through the eyes of the same toerags that she was told he was a greasy, Dark Arts-loving, muggle-hating Death Eater who lived down by the river who was going to ruin her for a respectable and handsome wizard who would give her a decent home and house elves?

******************************************

James had just shoo'd the house elf out after his head emerged from underwater in the bath, when he picked up the mirror and lowly called with urgency, "Sirius."

The mirror remained dark, but then he heard some girl speaking in maybe french, followed by what sounded like Sirius also in french.

"Padfoot!" James called.

He heard an exclamation of "Oi!" and then more french, getting louder.

There was light on the mirror now, and James could see Sirius above the mirror undressed before it was picked up. Sirius asked, "What is it, Prongs?"

James frowned. Sirius was trying to grow some sort of oddball beard and mustache thing. He looked like a fool. "I've been trying to talk to you for weeks."

"I'm on my honeymoon. Don't you read the paper?"

"Yes, but what are you doing?"

Sirius waggled his eyebrows, "Wouldn't you like to know, Prongs? You'll have to get your own, I'm afraid I'm not sharing. Appoline is a lady."

"That's not what I meant, you git. Why did you run away?"

"Run away? A bloke's got a right to a honeymoon, and I think mine is going to last for years to come."

"Stop being an ass. Parkin's dead, and you're off to France."

"Parkin? What do I have to do with that?"

"You had everything to do with it. My parents have me locked up and Moony's been sent to Azkaban."

"That was all Snape's fault, Prongs. I told you he was a vicious Death Eater. Listen, I have to go. Maybe you can visit us in Paris, maybe Christmas after next. Right? Cheerio."

James spluttered as the mirror went dark. Sirius had been notoriously thick headed before, but this was his best mate he was talking to, not some teacher.

* pop * "Master James done getting shampoo all rinsed out of hair? I's got fluffy towels all's warmed, sir."

James got out of the tub on autopilot and allowed the house elf to dry, powder and give him just a dash of his favorite cologne, and then dress him in his pajamas, help him belt his robe, and slide a pair of slippers onto his feet before he sat down meekly and allowed his wet hair to be combed. He forgot to run his fingers through it once the elf was done.

Was his best mate of all time gone?

******************************************

AN: The werewolf and children thing is not an original idea. It's from Lupin in Deathly Hollows.


	32. Chapter 32 “Friends”

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 32 "Friends"

Although Lily had made up her mind, she was nervous. She had scrapped this plan the morning she saw Black's marriage announcement in the Sunday paper. Lily was afraid Severus would be thinking that if Sirius Black could marry, why not him?

On Sundays, many students slept late so her and Severus were two of the few students at breakfast early. They could never go back to that room that Rosier and Wilkes used. It held too many memories of Helen.

He had been continuing to keep her company, and Mary was due back late this afternoon. On the whole, Severus had been very good to her. He didn't press her about marrying, which seemed to be the only thing Lily could argue with him.

Since the one time Lily insisted he hold her breast, she had been limiting her physical affection to no more than snogging. It was still bloody brilliant snogging, but the fact that she had not reciprocated the couple of times that Severus had … well, she didn't like to think about that because it got her all hot and achy, and ready to fall on her knees and beg Severus to do it to her again. Lily Evans would not beg because she had willpower. There.

Now at last, she would pay Severus back for totally undoing her sanity. If this went well, maybe they could do sneak off every Sunday, and maybe Saturday, morning. Mary liked to sleep late when she didn't have class.

Once they were outside the Great Hall, Lily took Severus' hand in hers and led the way to the second floor.

He asked, "What did you have in mind later with Mary? I could wait in the library after dinner, if you two wanted to join me there."

"I don't feel like talking about Mary now, Sev."

Severus frowned. He didn't want Lily locking herself away with MacDonald. If she wouldn't let him make the effort to be 'friends' with her friend, they would not miss him. No, Lily would not miss him at all.

Noticing that they had reached the ladies', Severus let go of Lily's hand to wait for her. She grabbed his hand and said, "Come on," while opening the door.

"But it's the girls …"

"Don't worry about it. I'm a prefect, and this one is out of order." To the room in general, Lily called out, "Hello?"

Severus had stopped in the doorway. This lavatory was poorly lit with dirty mirrors, chipped fixtures and was overall rather dreary. For all the time girls spent in the ladies', he was rather underwhelmed. It looked rather like the gents', except for the lack of urinals and graffiti on the walls naming Hogwarts' girls and their charms, or lack of them.

After a second call from Lily to verify they were alone in here, she urged Severus to follow her into the last cubicle. It looked rather plain to him. There was a toilet, as expected. Lily pushed up against him to get him inside, and then latched the door with both of them inside.

Lily looked up at Severus who was looking around everywhere but at her.

Severus did not see anything at all that looked interesting. There was not even a wall sconce, concealing a secret lever. Was it the flush mechanism of the toilet? That would be too obvious because anyone using this commode would flush. He turned to look at the inside of the door. There was nothing written there either. He found Lily to be looking expectantly at him. Since when was he a natural at finding secret things in lavatories? He asked, "What?"

Suggestively, she responded, "We're all alone, Sev."

"In a girls' toilet."

"An unused girls' toilet." With a jerk of her head and a downward glance at his trousers, Lily hinted, "Could you please take it out for me?"

Severus blinked, understanding which 'it' she meant. "I don't need to go, Lily."

"No, I don't mean that, Sev. I want to look at it."

He snorted, "Well, what was I supposed to think when you lock me in a toilet with you?" This was rather fortuitous, considering the changes he made in one runic charm. With consensually and mutually coaxed orgasmic fluids from both of them, it would make it very strong. He thought he'd have to wait till at least the Christmas break before Lily plucked up the courage to go further since she seemed scared of letting herself enjoy what he offered. Severus also needed to confirm that Lily was a virgin. He was almost positive she was, but this would not work otherwise and be a waste of time.

Lily had been prepared to argue with Severus, but he simply unzipped his trousers, reached in with his fingers and pulled it out. The green had faded more from that area of his body. His fingers were much greener. She swallowed when he let go of it.

"Did you want me to do something with it? Or did you mean 'look' as in Lily looking with her hands?"

Hesitantly she asked, "Uh, would that be alright?" Her hands already had a mind of their own as they reached for it. Oh gosh, she really was out of control.

"Would you allow me to deny you, Lily?"

"No," she breathed as she tentatively touched it, and then caressed with both her hands, to figure out how she wanted to hold his penis. This time Severus was awake. This could become so embarrassing. At least it was pointed the right way this time, and now she knew that this meant he wasn't sexually excited. At least not yet. It felt sort of like before. The skin was soft and sort of velvety over a core of something more solid. It was flexible and somewhat heavy, she thought as she turned it upward to look at the business end.

She looked at his face, his dark eyes were looking back into her green ones, he slowly slid his gaze downward and hers followed.

"Lily?" he asked.

Looking back up, she replied, "Yes?"

"If you want, you can do what you like with your new toy, and perhaps then I could kiss your bare skin?" She noticed Severus' gaze drop to her chest, before he looked back up into her eyes.

His smoldering dark eyes staring into hers were too much. "Um ..."

"I'll show you. Move your hand up here and then pull this back," he murmured, while guiding her hand to pull his foreskin back. He kept his hand on hers and indicated that it could slide a bit under her hand, imitating the movement that Helen had tried to teach her a lifetime ago.

Lily's mouth dropped open and she could no longer look up into Severus' face. She was mesmerized by what she was doing to Severus, especially when he removed his hand and allowed her to continue on her own. She could see and feel a change as his penis twitched and seemed to pulse to life within her hands.

Severus was trying to stay relaxed and allow his body do what it was supposed to. It was bizarre, and somewhat maddening, to have someone else touch him. Unlike some other boys, he didn't find touching himself to be an ideal way to pass the time. That might be good since if he was to fantasize about Lily fondling him, it wouldn't have been in a girls' toilet, and she might be a bit more verbal and look at his face occasionally, rather than … oh no, she was bending down further, she wasn't going to … Parkin was a swallower. Rosier was rather proud of that. Severus needed it, at least this time. If Lily wanted to use her mouth in the future, he'd give it a try. He doubted it could be worse than this.

When liquid oozed out, Lily leaned down to look. Was that it? She stopped moving her hand. She wanted Severus to scream, not just stand there.

"What's wrong?" he asked. If Lily thought this was funny, he might just go Marauder and shove her into the toilet.

"Oh, aren't you done?"

"Hardly."

"What's this stuff then?" she asked, touching it with her finger.

"Don't ..." Severus held himself back from insulting Lily. Calling her a dunderhead was not going to get this any closer to done with, or get him into her knickers. "Don't worry about that, Lily. You'll know. There's a big difference."

"Should I do it differently?"

"Can you do that and kiss me at the same time?"

"I could, but I'd like to see ..."

"I'll let you know."

"Alright. You better," Lily threatened as she stood and tilted her head, allowing the long kiss to begin as she resumed moving her upper hand and tried to squeeze him gently with the other.

Severus still couldn't tell if Lily was playing games. If she wanted to see anything, why was she starting an argument? That wouldn't get him any closer. It might take longer with her kissing him, but she wouldn't be distracted by studying his crotch like it was a disgusting specimen of bug. It would also keep her from talking and asking stupid questions. And why the bloody hell was she wearing trousers, he thought as his hands grabbed and kneaded her arse. How was he supposed to be in the right frame of mind for this sort of thing when Lily was being a bloody pain?

It was unusual for Severus to shove his tongue in her mouth. He was being a little rough with his snogging, and Lily wasn't used to him grabbing her bum. His fingers were digging in a bit as he pulled and lifted her against him. She was puzzled if he was angry that this was taking so much longer than it took her. If she was doing it wrong, he should say something. Lily felt like she got it right this time because she could barely tighten her hand on his penis now, it was so hard and inflexible.

To encourage Lily, he moaned into her mouth. Severus did not want her taking a break to ask questions; those could wait. Getting closer, he moved his hands to her waist. He intended to let her watch, but didn't want her completely stopping too soon. He also wanted her eager to let him do what he wanted to her. With that, he could finish the salve he needed to trace runes on their bodies while he said the charm.

Lily opened her eyes as she felt Sev's breathing hitch after he had so deliciously moaned into her mouth. His eyes were closed as he was kissing her. This was good, right? She felt his hand join hers. The one that was just holding him, not the one that was sliding above it. His eyes opened, his tongue retreated and he quickly urged her, "Don't stop, but look."

Fucking hell. This shuddering and twitching were intolerable to a person who preferred to stay in control of himself. He was almost certain he did not instruct Lily to get closer, but apparently she did from her defiled and gobsmacked face. Must not laugh. Must not. Or she will not let me in her knickers. Look concerned. Yes, concerned.

It would help if her beautiful eyes were not so wide in shock, and she could close her mouth. Shit. Make it seem alright, or better than alright, or even much better than alright. Softly Severus crooned, "Lily." Steeling himself, he put his hands up to her face, and with one of his thumbs wiped the fluid off her lower lip. "You were wonderful," he purred as he brought his lips to hers to snog her senseless.

Oh my God! Why didn't someone warn her about that? Was that even normal to shoot out like that? She was about to scream as she pulled her face away from getting hit, when more came out and shocked her by flying into her open mouth. What the heck? She forgot about it for a brief moment as she watched Severus' face. He was beautiful, and then he was so happy with her. Why couldn't he be like this more? At least just with her. Lily would keep it their secret that Severus Snape could sometimes be happy … deliriously happy. She'd definitely have to do this more with him, except maybe she could stand behind him next time. And maybe he could be more forceful like this when they snogged. She preferred putting her tongue in his mouth, but this was almost as bloody brilliant, especially this new thing with him clutching at her bum. They'd have to snog more standing up. Actually, they just needed to snog more.

Eventually their faces parted to allow them to breathe. Severus drew his wand and asked, "May I clean you up?"

Lily blushed and responded, "Please do."

Wordlessly he cast and secretly collected what he needed to fill an empty vial in his pocket, then disappeared the rest. He then asked, "Is it alright if I straighten up my trousers, or do you desire to hold me in your hands while I take my turn pleasing you, my love?"

The way Severus suggested it made Lily's stomach flutter. What she desired? She desired everything right now. "Do you want me to?" she asked, staring at it. It was pretty much like it was at first. Severus' dormant snake. Hanging down, and shyly hiding its sightless eye from her view.

"You were so magnificent, Lily, that I doubt I'd be able to think straight and be able to serve you properly," he replied as he put his penis away and zipped up. He then flicked his wand decisively at the toilet, before stowing it away also. Reaching down, he started unfastened Lily's trousers, asking, "Did you wear these on purpose to tease me today?"

A little dazed by Severus saying she was magnificent, she was startled,"Huh? What are you...?"

"Shhh. I want to worship your body, Lily. Let it be my temple. Please let me."

"But what are …?"

"It'll be better than it's ever been before," he said, before pulling her trousers and knickers down in a quick motion. "Sit down," he insisted, while pushing against her with one of his shoulders.

"It's ..." Lily started, before realizing he had transfigured the toilet into a padded chair with arms. As soon as she sat, Severus pulled off her shoes to finish getting her disrobed from the waist down, except for her socks. He was kneeling between her legs now and began kissing her knee, while sliding his hand along her calf. Lily was worried. If he turned his head, he'd be able to see everything. When she asked to see his, Lily didn't think he'd reciprocate by looking at hers. He was kissing her bare skin so sweetly, alternating between his lips and little bites. His lips were working their way up her thigh, and his hand had reached her ankle. He then massaged her foot and raised it up so her calf was on his shoulder. Lily was getting anxious as his mouth reached her upper thigh, but then with a obvious lick of his tongue first, he switched to her other knee and slowly repeated the process on her other leg. It was agonizing. She leaned away from her torturer and the chair's back slowly lowered so she was slightly reclining.

Severus smirked as he reached his goal. Lily definitely did not need a lust potion. She allowed him to pull her bottom closer to the chair's edge as he slid his shoulders up her legs so her thighs were now resting on them. Although he had heard a lot of disparaging comments about a woman's body, Lily's wasn't bothersome to him. Once she started with her moans of 'Sev', he snaked a little finger into her. Yes, she was a virgin. Good.

Lily could not believe how this felt. How did he even think to put his face there? And his tongue … oh, his tongue, what was he doing, especially kissing her there?

Even after she was finished screaming and trying to catch her breath, Severus continued feasting upon her. Was he trying to drive her mad?

He heard Lily start to weakly protest as she came crashing back to earth. Rather than acquiescing, he intentionally misunderstood and upgraded his assault on her flesh with his fingers. He was careful to avoid broaching her channel now that she was so sensitive to what he was doing, but he was not opposed to using the surplus lubrication she was leaking to slide it around and downwards, and then get her attention by teasing her with how wizards did it among themselves, since she desired some education in this area.

What was Severus doing? From where he was, he should have realized that she had reacted positively to his worship at her temple and wanted to stop. She tried to tell him, but with her thighs against his ears, she guessed he couldn't hear her. Lily tried to kick her legs free, but in this position, they were rather trapped, along with the focus of Severus' attention. The involuntary muscle contractions began shooting through her legs again when she felt Sev doing something rather strange and then felt him slide his finger into her … oh my. No. She … no.

Severus continued teasing Lily's body repeatedly to more orgasms. Apparently she liked any kind of stimulation in this area from the way she was twitching on his fingers, and moaned in disappointment when he removed them. Without him, she'd be a wanton whore. He had to get this charm onto her before some other fellow found out how libidinous his beautiful Lily was.

They were interrupted by a sudden coldness and a nasty sing song female voice mimicking, "Oh Sev. No. No. Oh Sev. Stop. Don't. Sev. You two make me sick. Bblllllaaaaugh!"

It was a ghost. Severus had the presence of mind to draw his wand and collect his other ingredient, while Lily struggled to right herself and failed miserably, while explaining, "Myrtle, we looked for you."

Severus looked at the ghost of a Ravenclaw student while assisting Lily to her feet. He had heard of her, but had not seen her before. She did not socialize with students like the others, and he guessed this was the toilet she haunted. Apparently she was talented, since there was an ectoplasmic puke puddle on the floor. Actually, it was squarely on Lily's trousers, knickers and shoes. They had to rendezvous in this toilet again. He didn't know if he found the ghost's puking on Lily's clothes funnier, or Lily's currently crazy dance in her socks while she held her hands in front of her nudeness.

Having gotten his fill of Lily's dancing, Severus drew his wand and levitated Lily's items. The ectoplasm existed in a slightly different plane so her clothes were untouched.

Hastily, Lily said, "Thanks, Sev," and grabbed her knickers. Once those were on, Lily tried to act normal and talk to the ghost. "Myrtle, uh, remember how I had stopped by and we talked about my dragonpox and the bullies?"

Myrtle was picking at a ghostly zit on her chin, rather than paying attention, but did respond, "Vaguely."

"Well, uh, this is the other student that had dragonpox, Severus."

"You were befouling my cubicle," Myrtle nastily clarified.

Severus restored the aged commode to its original condition. He rather liked this ghost. Lily couldn't bamboozle her with her innocent Gryffindor act.

"We were simply passing the time till you returned."

The ghost snarled, "Passing the time? Don't get me started. Do you want to hear how I pass the years, while floating in my U bend?"

Severus glanced at Lily. Did they really need to hear about a ghost's plumbing problems? Of course, because she tried to soothe the spirit with, "Myrtle, it … we were here a while, and it's not easy for us the way we are both picked on. You know what that's like. And anyway, well, he was inspired by what I told him about you and we got carried away with forgetting about those horrible other students and comforting each other."

His lip curled at this pathetic lie. Comforting each other?

The ghost nodded and started crying. "There was this one boy I had a crush on, but thanks to Olive Hornsby, he thought I was some weird girl that was stalking him."

The toilet overflowed behind Lily. Severus retreated by unlocking the cubicle door, but it was too late. All the toilets were disgorging water along with a couple of the sinks. At least he had his shoes on. He stopped at a sink that was still working, scrubbed his hands, rinsed his mouth out and quickly cleaned up his face. He saw Lily in the mirror scrambling out of the stall, slipping on the graying tiles with moldy grout in her very wet socks, clutching her trousers and shoes. He took hold of her elbow so she didn't suffer an actual injury and escorted her to the door, commenting, "This toilet was a brilliant idea, Lily."

"Oh ha ha, Severus. And you're going to dry all my stuff, funny guy."

"That's going to have to wait a moment, Lily," he commented, as they exited into the quickly flooding hallway. "Water flows down, so how about we head up?"

Once they had climbed a couple stairs, Severus sorted Lily's clothes, including her soaked socks, and held her shoes while she pulled on her trousers. He schooled his face into a look of patience, even though he was laughing on the inside.

******************************************

James was rudely awakened by his mother smacking him in the head with a newspaper. Merlin's beard! He still had one more week of this imprisonment.

"Get your arse out of bed!"

"What?" he complained.

"Your father's apoplectic. To have the Potter name in the paper regarding this werewolf attack is going to kill us, James."

"What? No, it was Sirius Black."

"Did you and Pettigrew know and then laugh about it?"

"No."

"Well?"

"No."

"Don't lie to me, James. Ever since you met that horrible Sirius Black, it's like you are a stranger to me. What happened to my sweet little Jamie boy?" she cried.

"Mum!"

"Just because you were born privileged, does not give you the right to ruin other people's lives. And that includes muggles, muggleborns and half-bloods. I am so ashamed of you."

"What?"

"Why would you ruin people's lives for fun, Jamie? What is entertaining about that?"

"What are you bloody talking about?"

"This article in today's paper about how the dead girl and the one that was infected were to be betrothed."

"Let me see," James said, snatching the paper. His mother had it folded open to a photo of obviously acting Slytherins, Wilkes and Rosier. Evans was not the one working on a betrothal!

Smack! "How dare you smile."

"Uh, it's Slytherins, mum. They're liars. And these two are definitely Death Eaters."

"How many times do I and your father have to tell you that all Slytherins, that's one-quarter of witches and wizards in Britain, are not Death Eaters!" She gave him another smack on the cheek. "It is no excuse to attack them or the young Gryffindor ladies that catch their fancy, young man. With that attitude, we might as well ship you to Azkaban now." James' mother dashed from the room, crying aloud.

Rereading the article, James muttered, "Stupid Slytherins." Sirius may be onto something. Slytherins and Gryffindors? Never. He got out of bed, rubbing his aching face to go to his trunk and pulled out the map. Good thing he had it last, instead of Padfoot or Moony. He wasn't sure he could recreate it on his own.

Only troublemakers would be skulking around the castle this early on a Sunday. Why did his parents have to wake at the crack of Merlin-loving dawn?

Rosier and Wilkes were down in the dungeons. Stupid pissheads, making his mum cry. Mulciber and Avery were down there too. Sirius' younger brother was turning in circles in their common room.

James' eyes scanned the map looking for the worst of them. There he was up on the first floor with Evans. Sodding Severus Snape. What was he up to, getting Evans off on her own like that? Where were they anyway? James looked at the surrounding area, and then when his eyes returned to the two little sets of footprints, he saw Moaning Myrtle with them. What was Snape doing in the ladies'? Was Evans sick after breakfast? She needed someone like James to look after her, not Snivelly.

If Evans was a werewolf, James would let her know he was an animagus and then he'd keep her company in the Shrieking Shack, like he used to do with Remus. Remus … why, oh why, did Sirius do that?

******************************************

Mary returned to school that afternoon. Lily had gone to their room after lunch to make sure everything was perfect for her, or at least as perfect as it could be until Lily figured out the truth of what her girlfriend needed help with.

Lily had spent a while laying atop her bed thinking about Severus. If they were married, Severus could do things like that to her every night, every afternoon, every morning when they woke up. She wouldn't get anything done, and probably not give a hoot. Hmm, no, Sev had things he wanted to do, and with both of them working, they'd make money faster. They couldn't keep each other in bed or on other furniture, the floor, against the kitchen counter and out in the garden all day, every day. Lily had difficulty moving onto her next thought because she kept visualizing Sev kneeling before her. She'd probably give up wearing trousers _and_ knickers for him.

She was still lost in a daydream, thinking about Myrtle not returning to that girls' room, and Severus continuing till she either drooled herself drier than the Sahara, or passed out from exhaustion, when Mary entered the room with Prof. McGonagall.

"There you are, Miss Evans."

"Uh yes, Prof. McGonagall. Welcome back, Mary," Lily said getting off her bed. She wasn't doing anything wrong, so there was no reason why she couldn't act like normal. She gave Mary an embrace.

Prof. McGonagall took care of setting out Mary's trunk in front of her bed. "I'll see you both at dinner than. Welcome back, Miss MacDonald."

With a huff, Mary sat down on the edge of her bed. "So here we are, Lily. Are you alright?"

"Yes, I was just laying there wondering when you'd be back. At least here, I knew for certain I'd catch up to you."

"Is all your homework done?"

"Sure is."

"You used to take all weekend, even if you just wanted to write it over one last time."

Lily shrugged, "With Sev checking it over, I don't feel there's any need. My grades are good, and in the end, it's only the NEWTs that count now."

"Yeah, that's the only reason I came back. Darned NEWTs. Now I'm going to have to find some kind of job once I graduate."

"That won't be bad, Mary. Taking control of your own life is good."

"I won't be in control as long as my body is ruled by the moon, Lily. No regular work is available for someone that's laid up sick for one week a month."

"Don't be so negative."

Mary sighed. Lily the optimist. She wouldn't be so chipper when she couldn't get her healer apprenticeship or a husband to take care of her. At least Mary's parents would live much longer than Lily's muggle ones. Growing old with her parents, she felt like a failure already in her first hour back at school.

******************************************

His parents visited him in Azkaban. They claimed Remus had only been here two weeks. He felt like it had been two years, or maybe two decades. The dementors were relentless. Remus had killed. He allowed those who allowed him to kill send him victims. Remus knew they'd send victims to him and he wanted that. He was a killer. A killer of young ladies full of hope and dreams. That is why his had been taken away.

Since he had no memories of how he killed Helen Parkin, or attacked Mary MacDonald or Lily Evans, his mind furnished gruesome images starring Fenrir Greyback, the only live werewolf Remus could remember. That's who had infected him.

Remus also thought about his speedy trial. His parents had paid for a good defense, but the Ministry and the Black family's solicitor were not on his side. Every time some explanation was submitted as to why Remus had become a danger during the full moon, that solicitor objected or asked for some witness or proof. It sounded like Remus was strolling the halls of the school on a rampage, rather than hiding in a out of the way spot, off the school grounds. The falsehoods brought the full weight of justice down on him.

Besides Sirius' hostile solicitor, his friends were not present at all. Not in person or spirit. Remus wouldn't ask James or Peter to support him against Sirius, but all their talk of lifelong friendship, the camaraderie of the unstoppable Marauders, or even the principles of honorable Godric Gryffindor meant nothing. Not in the face of such a betrayal.

******************************************

After a week of classes, Mary was feeling better over returning to school. She had known she could count on Lily, at the very least. The other Gryffindors, even the boys, were well-behaved and offered to help her whenever she needed it.

Evan and Malcolm did greet her in passing, but the special spark that had existed between her and Malcolm Wilkes had been extinguished. He had written her a very polite letter, letting her know that his family would never approve of his marrying a werewolf, but in her heart, she dearly hoped that he would defy them as soon as he set eyes on her again. Sadly, that was not the case.

Although she had been aware of Severus Snape before, as Lily's good friend, and that he occupied one of the six seats at their short-lived library study session, Mary had thought it would be just Lily and her. Like it was the three girls, including Helen, for their first five years at Hogwart's together. However, after noticing that she and Lily were frequently in his company, she started to notice that he was seeking them out, outside of Gryffindor tower.

Severus was polite, for him, and had not insulted her once. Even when she had totally cocked up a Defense essay, he pointed out the right section of the text and asked her to reread it. It got an absolutely mad idea hatching in Mary's brain. She'd have to check with Lily first.

Lily returned to the tower after a early morning snog session with Severus. They were going to Hogsmeade later with Mary, and Lily was thinking about how to suggest how they could split up for some shopping. With Lily staying at Hogwarts for the holiday, this December trip to Hogsmeade would be her last chance to shop, unless she ordered by owl. Planning with Mary would get her mind off the full moon in a few days. At first, Mary didn't want to come, but Lily had finally convinced her yesterday that she would be terribly lonely there without her company.

Entering their room, Lily found that Mary was already up and had taken a lot out of her trunk, and had hung up at least ten outfits and matched up different shoes, cloaks, scarves, hats and gloves with them. Evidently, her feelings about Hogsmeade had changed dramatically, rather than just caving in to Lily's nagging.

"Did you already have breakfast, Lily?"

"Yes, I did. I didn't want to wake you."

"That's alright. It's just that I didn't see you down in the Great Hall."

Lily's eyebrows raised. Mary was up early on a Saturday. Did she have something special planned? As far as Lily knew, she had been with Mary most of the week. She didn't want to bring it up, in case Mary had nothing in mind. "That's a lot to choose from, Mary."

"I'm so undecided," she fretted, while digging into her trunk for a pair of plum-colored tights that she knew she owned. Once she found those, and a pair of lovely olive ankle boots with dainty silver buckles and toe caps that she almost forgot she had, Mary asked, "What's Severus' favorite color?"

Lily answered without thinking, "Green." She stopped with her mouth still open. Was that his favorite color? Sev said his favorite color were Lily's eyes, but he may have just said that to be nice.

Mary shrugged and muttered, "Slytherin." All that digging for the tights was a waste of time.

Feeling that Mary might think she wasn't getting into the spirit of things, Lily began to search through her trunk for a Hogsmeade outfit. Severus didn't have problems like this. He'd just wear black trousers and a white shirt, part of his school uniform. He didn't know how lucky he had it.

"Lily?"

"Huh?"

"You and Severus are best mates, right?"

"Yes, but you're also my best mate, Mary."

"You're mine too, Lily."

"Thanks."

"So you're only best mates?"

"With Severus?"

"Well yeah, I mean I've seen you give him a quick peck on the lips and put your arms around him, and then there was that one time when you had been drinking at the Hog's Head, but I wanted to be sure that this 'just friends with him' thing was still the case."

"I guess," Lily replied. She didn't want to flaunt that she still had Severus when Mary lost Malcolm, and both Mary and Helen didn't think Severus was good enough for Lily so she didn't want to reopen that argument when they had a lovely day ahead of them so close to the full moon.

"Good … so uh, you wouldn't mind if I sort of set my cap for Severus then?"

"Set your cap?"

"Well yeah, Lily. Wouldn't you like that if your two best friends got together?"

"You and … Severus?"

"Sure. It makes perfect sense. Don't you see? I know about him from you and Malcolm, so that life debt I owe him will help. He can't think I'm pretending to fancy him to stab him in the back or something. And speaking of that, I already know that he's got scars, and he knows that I do too, so that's another thing out of the way. He's also friendly to me, even when he knows I'm a werewolf. And if there's someone who would make a terrible father, it's got to be him, so no children's not a problem either."

"Uh …." Lily said, trying to think of where 'perfect sense' came into Mary's logic at all. Not that Mary's scars were her fault, but Severus didn't deserve his either. And terrible father? Where or what did that come from? "Um … I don't think he'd be interested, Mary."

"Why not? I know he may act like he's not interested, but everyone wants someone to love them, Lily."

"But Sev's uh ..."

"What aren't you telling me, Lily? Does he fancy blokes?"

"No."

"I didn't think so. What's the problem?"

"He's …" Lily wanted to say the truth, but what was it? Snoggalicious friend who had wicked fingers and a tongue that Lily didn't want to ever share with anyone? Her future husband didn't sound right, but it was very likely. Was she afraid to let someone know that her and Severus were a couple? "... he's uh, very reserved, Mary. I think you might be too much for him to handle."

Mary rolled her eyes at her roommate, "I'm not suggesting that I sashay over to him in the Front Hall and snog him senseless while attempting to tame his dragon dick with both hands, Lily."

Lily gasped. If Mary grabbed Sev's anything, Lily might hex her faster than Severus himself.

"What?" Mary asked. "I can control myself for a bit, but knowing the size of that broom has me salivating to go for a ride."

"Mary!"

"What? That's what's great about this life debt. He knows I won't bite it off."

"Bite?"

"Well, that would be a risk wouldn't it? He has no reason to trust anyone. Severus has been the target of half of Gryffindor and maybe most of Slytherin since he set foot in this school, and his Head of House treats him like rubbish. Maybe you and Helen are hoodwinked by Slughorn, but I'm not one of his favorites either, but unlike Snape, I know I'm not brilliant."

Mary was talking so fast and jumping through subjects so quickly, Lily's head was spinning between biting, everyone attacking Severus, and Slughorn being a git. "I don't think you'd be happy, Mary. Sev's got nothing. I mean, you deserve better. You love your clothes and the kind of house that would make you content, is well beyond his means. He doesn't even have house elves."

"Happy? What would make me happy is to not be a werewolf and get my hand back from that foul Lupin. I've had to rethink everything, Lily. I want someone who will love me. Love me and protect me. I don't want to go to Azkaban. I don't want to be a killer. What good is stuff when I'm sitting in a cell for the rest of my life with dementors as my only company?"

"I just can't see the two of you together, Mary. There's plenty of others, and the fellow for you probably isn't even a student at Hogwarts right now. You have time, and I'm sure your parents will help you find the man that is meant for you."

"Nevertheless, I still think Severus is worth trying for. I mean, if not me, than who's he got? He hardly says anything to anyone else. He doesn't have any reason to even allow someone close enough to give him a chance to trust them. For all he's done for us, Lily, he doesn't deserve to be left alone with no one."

"I'm not leaving him," Lily protested.

"You're his friend, Lily. He deserves to have more than someone who drops him a letter every month or so to let him know how her husband and children are."

"I wouldn't do that to him."

"You'd want him to … live next door? What if your husband couldn't stand the sight of him?"

"Why would I marry someone that didn't like my best friends? That's crazy, Mary."

"There's hardly anyone that likes Severus."

"Well … well, you didn't like him so much either," Lily argued childishly.

"That's before I got to know him. He's in a different house, Lily. How was I to know? Especially with all that crap the boys were telling us about all the Slytherins being Death Eaters."

"That was the only thing they could say to make them look like the good guys. Gryffindors idolize heroes, not bullies."

"That's why we're all idiots," Mary darkly replied. She turned to look at her clothes. Severus wasn't an idiot.

******************************************

Severus was passing through the Slytherin Common Room very pleased with himself. Besides the potions ingredients he needed to complete his special project from the student store, he was able to take his pick from Slughorn's unlocked cupboard since he had unsupervised favorites working on their personal pet endeavors. The fool even left _felix felicis_ in there. Severus only took one bottle. That would be all he would need to complete this. He didn't want to leave anything to chance since once Lily was no longer a virgin, there would be no second chance with this method. Everything else seemed so hamfisted. Severus didn't want to change what was Lily, except maybe to swab out her ears so she'd hear something other than her own voice.

He hoped Malcolm Wilkes didn't end up as Head Boy. Not that Severus didn't enjoy a challenge, but it was so easy to impersonate someone he shared quarters with, especially a rich boy with too much stuff to keep track of it, he thought as he removed the spare prefect badge from his robes before the Polyjuice wore off.

******************************************

Regulus was sitting in the common room, thoughtfully biting his lower lip and waiting for Barty. At least Barty was dependable as a friend, even if all his studies made him as squirrelly as a runespoor with all three heads. Regulus could talk himself blue in the face claiming that Sirius was no real brother of his, and would readily agree that he had no style, wit, panache, or the least scrap of cunning. He's off in France or wherever screwing his little brain out with a half-veela french trollop, and Regulus was left at Hogwarts to uphold what little family honor and dignity remained. He had to attack the two Gryffindors that the Slytherins liked – Parkin and MacDonald. Stupid ass thug waving around a sign for months saying how much he hated Parkin. Now the Slytherins thought Regulus was too weak-minded and simple to understand much of anything unless it began with 'once upon a time'.

Oh no, it was Wilkes again. He left for breakfast with Rosier not even thirty minutes ago. Regulus slid down in his seat. Wilkes was too much of a gentleman to simply jinx him in the face, but the sneer he gave indicated that he better not catch Black in a dark, dungeon corridor alone. Reg was relieved he wasn't seen this time. Merlin. If Regulus could, he'd hop a portkey over to France right now and give his brawny brother the arse kicking of a lifetime, right in front of his wife too.

******************************************

When Severus came up the dungeon stairwell, he found Evans and MacDonald waiting for him to go to Hogsmeade. They both looked angry. Against his better judgment, he asked, "Is something wrong?"

Simultaneously, they both answered, "No."

They were fighting with each other? Crap. Why? Why? He'd still have to be nice to MacDonald because if he snubbed her, he'd be the bad one when Evans made up with her in a couple hours.

Lily took hold of his left arm and insisted, "Let's get going." She even pulled him along to make her point.

He resisted and stopped when MacDonald grabbed his right arm. "Release my wand arm."

"Alright," Mary responded, and smiled at him as she slid her hand under his cloak and ran it over the back of Rosier's transfigured wool jumper towards his waist.

"Stop it," Severus said, pulling his other arm from Lily to twist around to get MacDonald off him. "If you two are playing some game, I don't want to be part of it. You can do whatever between yourselves, just stop touching me."

Lily's eyes narrowed. Where did Mary touch him after she let go of Sev's arm?

Mary shrugged at Lily, and followed Severus who was losing his patience and walking out to avoid any scenes in the Front Hall. It was doubtful anyone would think girls were fighting over him, but he was sure to get at least a detention if a fight broke out around him. A fight might also force him to take sides in their petty girl squabble. After years of Lily and Petunia, he wasn't falling for it.

Both Lily and Mary were jostling each other on his left. Severus stopped. "Is this something I should know, or would you prefer I mind my own business?"

"Uh … it's … I don't know, Sev," Lily explained, or didn't explain.

He jerked his head, "Alright. Did you still want to go to Hogsmeade?"

"Yes."

"Yes, let's," Mary added. "We were being silly. Sorry."

"That's fine," Severus replied, resuming their walk. "Sometimes it seems I'm expected to know things, when the clues aren't clear."

"It's not you, it's us, Sev," Lily muttered, and then gave his upper arm a quick pat.

"I'm sure they have plenty of Sugared Butterfly Wings at Honeyduke's, Lily. There's no need to fight with Mary about them."

Lily made an outraged shriek, while Mary laughed, "You like those? Eewe."

"They're not really butterfly wings?"

"You could ask. I always thought they were," Mary commented. "They probably transfigure objects to get them nice and pretty, rather than catching them. But still, they don't taste so good to me."

"It's like a piece of wet paper on your tongue," Lily complained.

"Exactly. Do you like those, Severus?"

"No."

"What are your favorite sweets?" Mary asked.

Lily filled in the growing silence by answering, "Ooh, I'd have to say dark chocolate, but I don't think I've tried everything yet. What about you, Sev?"

"What?"

"Sweet foods you like?"

"Oh, that's what I thought you were asking, but …" he sighed, then said, "fruit, I guess."

"With some kind of coating?" Mary asked.

"Coating?" Severus repeated. "No, just plain."

"They can dip it in things other than chocolate, Sev," Lily added.

"I don't think I'd care for that."

"Do you like some of the more exotic things like cockroach clusters or blood pops?"

Although Lily knew Mary was directing the question to Severus again, he remained silent. Lily said, "No, neither of us like those. Do you?"

"Heck no. So uh ... what caused you to develop such a strong will power against sweets, Severus? Strict control over your weight or your teeth?"

He turned his head to look at MacDonald. What was her problem? Her questions were worse than Lily's. "Not at all. The area I live in is dangerous so children are warned away from people offering sweets, and that led to a dislike of sweets in general."

"Even from your parents and relatives?"

"I don't recall candy being in the house," he answered vaguely.

Lily could believe that. Well, there might be a big wad of living cockroach cluster, but they'd starve to death at the Snapes unless they could live on gin. She frowned, that was not a nice thing to think of. Severus obviously was fed something, other than boiled faux chicken hopefully. His father certainly had a well-fed appearance.

Mary did not feel things were going in her favor. Lily and her had annoyed him from the start, and even though he had brought up Honeyduke's, Severus did not eat candy.

Seeing Mary raise her eyebrows at her, Lily attempted to restart the conversation. "Did you have a lot of shopping that you wanted to get in, Mary?"

"Uh, well um, maybe a few things for my immediate family so they don't see what I get them for Christmas. We'll probably be back to Hogsmeade once I'm home for Christmas. There's a few days before, I think."

"Oh, not Diagon Alley?"

"Hogsmeade is so much nicer this time of year. There's no snow yet, but when there is, it's so lovely. It really gets me in the spirit. I remember you're staying at the school this year, Lily, because of your dragonpox. Are you going to buy something today and owl it home?"

"I suppose. I really had my fingers crossed that I'd look better, but I'm just going to have to accept it. I really enjoy seeing my family at Christmas. You covered that in Muggle Studies right?"

"Oh, I think it was back in fourth year. It's sort of similar right, with trees, singing and presents?"

"And food," Lily added.

"Are you going to miss your family celebrations too, Severus?"

"My family does nothing for Christmas. Besides, I stay at the school all year, except for the summer holiday."

That sort of threw Mary off-track. It sounded rather bleak. Undeterred, she asked, "What's it like at Hogwarts when everyone's gone?"

"Quiet. It's not as if I'm the only one still there. There's other students, and many of the staff are here for either all or part of the days off. More students stay during the Easter break, especially fifth and seventh years."

"I guess you can get a lot of reading done than," Mary commented, trying to sound positive. She knew he and Lily had started the year with seven NEWT level classes. Absolute madness.

As they entered the village, Lily asked, "Did you want to go to the Three Broomsticks first, or meet back there in an hour or two?"

"Do you really need two hours?" Severus asked. He only had one destination in mind without Lily, and either it would be successful or not very quickly.

"You could come with me, Severus, if you don't think it would bore you too much," Mary suggested.

"Let's decide as we walk to Honeydukes then," Lily countered. "Maybe we can loosely stick together?" She couldn't tell, but knowing Severus, bored was not the likely emotion he would feel trapped with Mary in Gladrags. Actually, Lily didn't want Severus in Gladrags at all since that's where she would be shopping for him. She also did not want Mary's company because she'd get the wrong idea if she caught Lily buying Severus undergarments for Christmas, and Lily had no intention of discussing what was wrong with his current items.

Severus decided to be a wise ass in Honeyduke's and handed her a box of sugared butterfly wings to look at. The box looked so innocent with its sky blue background covered with different colored butterflies. She turned it over, and it contained two ingredients: butterfly wings and sugar. Wow. She really ate a butterfly wing. She said, "Alright. I am now educated on the dangers of the headmaster's tea. He'll eat anything coated with sugar." Hopefully, capitulating to Severus in this fashion would end this discussion. He was right. For once. It happened so rarely that Lily supposed he was entitled to his moment. No need to be so smug and smirking. Really. He acted so childish sometimes.

She picked out a selection of the tamer, but magically exotic items to send home, based on her parents' previous likings. Petunia did not like anything magical, or so she said. Somebody had been chewing Droobles in the loo because the bubbles were still in there on Boxing Day when Lily went to take a shower. Hiding them in the shower enclosure wasn't so bright because Lily found them. Ah ha!

The emerged from Honeydukes without a plan. Lily tried to take charge, "Well, um, there's Zonko's that none of us will admit we're going into, Dervish & Banges, Gladrags and Scrivenshaft's. So with three possible destinations left and three of us, can we rotate through them individually? Maybe fifteen minutes each, unless there's a terrible crush?"

Sarcastically, Severus exclaimed, "Isn't it always in Scrivenshaft's?" He was referring to the quill and stationery store. He wasn't heading to any of the three. "How about I wait outside the Three Broomsticks until one of you joins me, then the two of us will grab a table and wait for the third before ordering any food?"

Lily thought her idea was better and was about to say so, when Mary interrupted while she was drawing breath to let Severus know what she thought. Mary said, "That's sounds fine." She had every intention of beating Lily there and immediately headed off to get to Gladrags first.

"Sev, I need to tell you something."

"What?"

"Mary fancies you."

"That's crazy."

"I know, but she does."

"Why would she when we're together?"

"She doesn't know that."

"Couldn't you say something, rather than let her act like whatever she's doing right now?"

"No, I didn't want to hurt her feelings."

"You want me to hurt her feelings instead?"

"No, I … I didn't think she would get serious so fast."

"I wouldn't call her questions as serious as trying to kiss me or something, but do you want me to go back to the castle?"

"No, than she'll think she offended you."

Severus sighed. "Do you want me to do anything, or try to ignore her?"

"Play dumb. Like a boy."

He gave Lily a half-hearted sneer, and muttered, "It might be best to tell her the truth. She might be angry at you later."

"If she knew the truth, she'd be heartbroken."

"Heartbroken over me, when I barely speak to her? I think it's you who's going to break her heart, Lily."

Lily bit her lip. "You may be right. Let's see how it goes, and then if it looks bad, I guess you can tell her."

"Me? You could have already told her."

"I don't know what to say. She'll take it better coming from you. She trusts me too much."

With exasperation, he replied, "Than continue to keep that trust, rather than being deceitful."

"I'm protecting her feelings, Sev."

"If you waste too much time here warning me, I'm going to have to spend enough time with her over drinks that it will force me to say something, if Mary starts to tell me of her feelings for me. Perhaps you got it all wrong."

"No, she said she wanted to set her cap for you."

"What's that?"

"When a lady pursues a gentleman."

He shook his head in disgust, "Let me get going. And don't think I'm not considering that you put some mad idea into her head for your own amusement, Lily."

Lily followed him, hissing, "I wouldn't do that."

"Mary better not show up with blue and pink toothbrushes."

"I thought that was rather clever."

Severus stopped and turned to her. "Do you ever consider that I easily accept your suggestions because I love you, Lily?"

"Since when do you accept my suggestions?"

"I know you crave to make the mundane into adventures along with solving mysteries that don't exist because to you that's fun. I enjoy you sharing that with me, Lily. Not everyone else understands that. When you try to make things more exciting, you could be making their lives more complicated at a time when they aren't seeking something out of the ordinary."

"I'm not being cruel," Lily responded.

"No, and I know it's more for your personal entertainment than to make fun of others. I'm not accusing you of being mean to Mary, however the truth might be kinder in the long run. I'll tell her something if she gives me some indication. Perhaps in a way that will make it seem like a big misunderstanding."

"Tell her what? That you prefer wizards?"

"Why would I tell her a lie like that?"

"I don't know. Mary had asked me earlier."

"Did you tell her I did?" Severus asked incredulously.

"No."

"Then why did you just suggest it to me?"

"I have a lot on my mind, and you're picking on me."

"Then stop following me."

"Where are you going? That's the Hog's Head."

"Why it is. Maybe I need a stronger drink than what they offer at the Three Broomsticks to students."

"You're not. Don't. You're not even seventeen. Even if you were, that's too young for strong spirits."

"So you plan to stick to me like glue until I meet up with Mary?"

"No, I got shopping to do."

"In the Hog's Head?"

"Of course not."

Severus waited. Lily stared at him, then said, "I'm not in the mood to goof off around here. I'll see you in the Three Broomsticks and you better not reek of … whatever."

He tilted his head rather than responding with MacDonald's name. Lily was an absolute idiot setting her friend on him. Unless she was kidding him for fun to get him staring at MacDonald and interpreting her every gesture as an overture to get his attention. That had to be it. She wasn't cruel enough to trick a girl that had lost her possible fiancé due to a werewolf bite. Severus certainly was not comparable to Malcolm Wilkes in looks, wealth or status. He might not even be good enough for Slughorn to get him a job cleaning Wilkes' loo.

Fixing his mind on the absolute fact that he was indeed seventeen, Severus entered the Hog's Head and went to the bar. He inquired, "How much is a bottle of Meddyglyn mead?"

The barkeep studied Severus carefully with his blue eyes, before replying, "Twelve sickles."

"May I purchase two bottles please?" He had expected it to cost more, but it may have been a joke to get the girls drunk on inexpensive swill during their last visit. With the way they were guzzling it, Severus probably would have chosen to do that himself.

He paid for the bottles and shrunk them down to carry inconspicuously, and headed back through town to wait at the Three Broomsticks.

Severus was not outside long when he noticed MacDonald heading his way with a smile beaming at him. He raised an eyebrow in reply. Perhaps her and Lily were having a laugh on him? Lily told him that crazy tale and now Mary was going to act like she fancied him? Gryffindors. They wouldn't be so lighthearted this week with the full moon. He might as well humor them. That was going to be painful. Neither of them deserved that.

"Why so crestfallen, Severus? You wanted Lily to beat me here?"

"It's fine. I was merely thinking."

"Let's go in and grab a table then."

"Alright," he agreed and followed her into the building. It was loud, but not as dark and smoky as the pub his father frequented. Didn't smell as bad in here either. There were a lot of younger students inside enjoying warm butterbeers, but they lucked out because a group was vacating their table as they worked their way inside.

He purposely let her sit down first so he could seat himself opposite her, rather than allowing MacDonald to sit next to him.

"Did you already finish your shopping?" she asked.

"Since only Lily sends me a gift, it stays simple."

"Did you get her something nice?"

"I strive to gift her with something personal. She has many nice things already."

"What kind of personal?" Mary asked suggestively.

"Something between us. That shows a bit of thought."

"Like what?"

He shrugged at her. His gifts were always inexpensive, but he did make an effort to make them one of a kind and for Lily alone. They weren't to impress her friends.

Mary ordered a butterbeer, while Severus requested water.

"Was it hard growing up not celebrating Christmas?"

"Not really. I noticed the decorations and lights, but it wasn't until I started talking to Lily and her sister that they explained to me it was to celebrate the birth of Jesus. Their mother tried to tell me more about him, but there's too much to it that they've learned since they were practically toddlers."

"Is that some muggle thing?"

"I don't think so because his death is just before Easter, and we have that holiday off of school also. That can't be a coincidence."

"Christmas is about getting presents. Easter's about candy."

"Then there's really no point to them at all," Severus replied. He had no interest in candy. Other than Lily, he received no presents, and given the means, he would want to give Lily presents even when there was no occasion to do so. Why limit it to one day other than her birthday?

With saving her life, she doubted her parents would put up much of a fuss if she asked them to invite Severus to their home, but then Lily would be left alone at school. Mary felt a strange sense of wrongness from Severus. His experience of life was so drastically different than hers with candy meaning danger, and having Christmas happen around you, but not celebrating it. She'd have a lot of work ahead of her with this one. He did have the most important quality, that's what was essential. Severus did not step over her prone body to run out of the Shrieking Shack. St. Mungo's said what he did saved her life and it was not a quick spell to cast. The caster needed to concentrate on her wounds while there was a werewolf loose in the room. If Severus left, she would have been eaten up like Helen.

******************************************

Once Lily completed her purchase of male underwear for 'her brother' at Gladrags, she didn't know what else here to get for Severus. He definitely needed these new underpants and undershirts, however he might be in a rotten mood Christmas morning and not appreciate anything.

This would be the first time in years that she saw him on Christmas day. Actually, would it be the first Christmas that she saw him on the 25th? Maybe. After she met Severus, they sort of met by arranged rendezvouses, less in the winter when it was too cold outside. They also exchanged notes that he would leave on her back porch under a rock. For those two or three years before Lily and Severus attended Hogwart's, she probably was too busy to see him till at least the 26th or 27th. Her family came first. It still did, but now Lily was sure her mum would let Sev in the house for a short bit to say hello to her. However, he was at Hogwarts every year because of the cost of train fare to get home from King's Cross. Next year, they could apparate. Then Sev would finally get to taste some of the wonderful food her mother made only for Christmas. Even he would like her mum's pudding. Lily sniffed. She hadn't been home for Stir-Up Sunday in years, and had already missed it this year. Were students over seventeen allowed to apparate home for weekend visits? She'd love to do that next year.

Lily took a quick spin around Dervish and Banges to see if anything caught her interest for herself or Severus. She frowned. She used to think Severus lied about doing nothing for Christmas. Lily remembered she was mad at Severus for telling her that in an attempt to make her feel sorry for him. She asked and he answered with the truth. He didn't elaborate with some story. Severus said his family did not do anything special. What an idiot she was. A Christmas tree at the Snapes? Lights? She wasn't even sure they had electricity.

She was madder at herself than Severus. Whenever she thought her best friend was trying to tell her something crazy to take advantage of her, it turned out that he was pretty much right whenever it was something factual. Like sugared butterfly wings were butterfly wings. Then he'd tease her, but only about the silly things, like the wings. She wasn't in any danger from eating it. He didn't dance around around her, laughing and screaming 'I told you so' about serious things. Actually, Severus didn't out of hand like that. Lily had seen enough of that in the Gryffindor common room. There were some real buttwipes in her house.

And what about Mary? He might be right. Lily could have at least said she was interested in her best friend in a romantic way too, rather than letting Mary think that Severus was free for her to sink her hooks into. What if Severus liked the attention Mary gave him? If she turned on the heavy charm, she'd listen to him, and not call him a liar or something else insulting. That might be bit heady to Severus. He wasn't used to that sort of thing. Would he decide he preferred Mary? That would be so wrong. She didn't love him like Lily did. Mary wouldn't even try to understand Severus, she'd just want to mold and train him into what she wanted.

Entering the Three Broomsticks, Lily was determined to take immediate action, if the situation warranted it. There they were, sitting opposite each other. Not laughing, not smiling and not holding hands across the table. Good.

Severus looked up when Lily barreled into the side of him when she pulled out the chair next to him. He had been thinking that if he got Lily's explanation of holidays wrong, Mary would have a laugh telling her later, and then Lily would be quite cross with him for not paying careful attention to what she said. He must have gotten it wrong for Mary to pretend she didn't know what he was talking about.

"Everything alright?" he asked.

"Fine," Lily replied, looking at Severus' water glass. She hadn't meant he couldn't have anything to drink.

After he took a deep breath, Severus confessed, "I may have made a total hash out of what you told me, Lily."

Lily's eyes widened, then she looked at Mary. Mary didn't look upset. She looked back at Severus, who continued, "Was the name Jesus, and he was born on Christmas, then he died and came back from the dead on Easter?"

She blinked. If Mrs. Evans were here, she'd probably hug Sev tightly and plant a smacker right on his lips. That's what got Severus into the Evans' house. When Petunia came home and told her mother what a little long-haired, unwashed heathen that Snape boy was for not knowing anything about who Jesus was, her mother surprised her and from that day forward, Severus became 'that poor boy'. "Yes, Severus. That's correct."

"Is that some muggle thing you told Severus?" Mary asked.

"What do wizards say about Christmas?" Lily responded, thinking about the all the Christmas trees. There were stars on theirs at Hogwarts, and weren't the live fairies fluttering around supposed to represent angels?

"It's a holiday when you exchange presents and spend time with your families."

"Why?"

"Why not? It's tradition."

"Didn't they mention why they celebrated Christmas in Muggle Studies?"

"The same reason as us, Lily. I think the religion stuff is next year. Muggles have so many different kinds to explain what they don't understand."

Didn't understand? Lily may be a witch, and not going to church every Sunday while she was here at school, however she was not going to give up her faith. Without God, where did all this come from? Knowing Severus, he probably had some crazy notion, but the rest of the wizards? She was surrounded by so much stupidity at Hogwart's, they probably thought the universe came out of Merlin's arse. That's why so many of these toerags had no sense of wrong or right. As long as they weren't caught breaking the law, they thought they didn't have to answer to any higher authority.

Lily was readying her rant in her head, when she was asked a question by the waitress. "Yes, I'll have a warmed butterbeer please." She then looked over the menu she was given to choose something hot, meaty and dripping with gravy for lunch while her mind grumbled about wizards being idiots.

"What are you going to order, Sev?"

"I'm fine."

Lily frowned at him. "We're eating, so get something."

"I need to pay for my apparition class. Ministry's charging each of us twelve galleons."

She gasped and exclaimed, "I forgot to pay you back. I'm so sorry, Sev. At least let me buy you lunch." Lily started digging into her purse, "How much was it? Why didn't you remind me?"

"It's not important," Severus muttered.

"I wouldn't have been able to get the paper while in the hospital, and that woman was unbearable. You saved me the embarrassment of her yelling at me at the very least."

When Severus made no move towards the sickles she had put on the table, or to look at his untouched menu, Lily picked hers back up to scan it for suggestions. She silently read some of her favorites to herself … and found they no longer appealed to her. Lily wanted bloody meat, rare, red and warmed to body temperature.

"I'm getting the roast. Why don't you get that too, it sounds absolutely delicious, Severus," Mary suggested.

"It's bad enough we're both going to be eating that at the same table as him," Lily grumbled. "I can't help that either, I'm sorry. I want meat. Badly"

"I understand."

"They don't really have much of a good selection. It's meat, potatoes and desserts. Did you want some of my potatoes?"

He leaned over to look at what Lily was pointing at. "I'll order my own. Gravy's um … nice with meat."

Lily laughed, and then the waitress was back to take their order. After their order was taken, Lily sobered at the thought that Severus could have been cursed to crave meat, just as easily as her and Mary. What would that be like? Craving food that disgusts you. Lily wasn't even interested in fish which used to be her favorite, and when she thought of pork or poultry, well, what she desired was rather unsanitary. Those needed to be cooked to a certain internal temperature to kill bacteria, but Lily imagined the taste of poorly cooked meat would be worth every minute she spent in the loo being ill. If she was a werewolf, Lily would not catch food borne illnesses? Was that the sure sign that she really was one?

She realized that Mary was trying to engage Severus in more frivolous conversation, and wouldn't leave off when he replied he had no familiar, and was not interested in owning an owl.

Lily interjected, "I find my owl to be useful during the summer holiday to carry messages, but she's not very interesting. She's also a bit stinky when she's inside too much."

"I agree. The Owlery is positively disgusting," Severus replied.

Lily's lip curled involuntarily. Even with a horde of house elves, the Owlery was out of control.

Mary looked at the two of them. They were about to eat, and had to bring up Hogwarts' Owlery? Her disgust was short-lived when the fragrant roast, mashed potatoes and the barest acknowledgement to green in the form of a tiny mound of mushy peas, all drowning in gravy was placed in front of her. She attacked the beef without hesitation, and then started to enjoy anything covered in the greasy gravy.

As she slowed on the peas, she took note that Severus had a potato, plain and served uncut, as he requested. He had dissected it thoroughly and precisely before he began eating the pieces. Plain. With no butter, sour cream, cheese, catsup or whatever it is muggles used on potatoes. No wonder why he looked like a skeleton with a skin suit stretched over him. Mary's house elves could fatten him up. Keep him locked in the bedroom till he got some meat on them bones. Perhaps even shackled to the bed so he didn't get any exercise. That was the one of the saddest things about losing Malcolm. No more shagging. She loved shagging.

Rather than watching MacDonald inhale her food, Severus concentrated on looking over his potato. To the side of him, Lily had also began with the beef, though at a slower pace. He had thought it safe to look up once he his entire serving reduced to bite-sized pieces, however MacDonald was drooling while she looked at him. How could she be that hungry that she'd be longing for his food too? It wasn't the werewolf thing because he had no flesh on his plate, sodding Gryffindors were just that openly greedy. At least Lily's parents were decent people that instilled a sense of restraint and manners into their girls. Lily would be unbearable if she behaved like the rest of her house.

******************************************

Prof. McGonagall was finalizing her notes at the end of the brief staff meeting with the headmaster and heads of house. She had an event penciled in, however she had been waiting for information since one of the invitees was a muggle. The Ministry was willing to hold it at Hogwarts for the students, but a muggle would not make that possible.

"If there's nothing more …" Albus started.

"There is," Minerva interruped. "Horace, what response did Eileen Snape return?"

"Snape?"

"Yes, Severus' mother, Mrs. Snape. His father is a muggle."

"Oh right, well, you know I've been thinking about that ..."

"Did you even write?"

"Well that's the thing ..."

"Horace, Mr. Snape is your student, and his mother was also. You said you'd handle it."

Prof. Flitwick tsk'd, "Really, Horace." He shook his head. It was bad enough that Horace slipped out of dealing with the horrible, heart-wrenching tasks, but when one of his students was going to receive an award he'd rather correspond with quidditch players. Mr. Snape was a bright, talented student who showed a great deal of initiative, and would surely go far with a bit of encouragement.

"Why don't we just press on without them?" Horace suggested. Eileen Prince had been even more sullen than her son. She drifted through the school like a black cloud as a student. Her only friend was a spotty and equally moody Ravenclaw, and when she was killed by Slytherin's monster, Prince gave up on everything. She even went and married a muggle. For every sterling, exemplary student Horace hoisted out of the muck, there was another one just digging themselves deeper into their droppings.

Albus frowned at Horace's continued disservice to one of the students. He would have given anything for his parents to watch him receive his Order of Merlin. Although Mr. Snape's was only going to be third class, it was quite an accomplishment for a sixteen year old. Horace's grumbling notwithstanding, the incident in the Shrieking Shack could have been more deadly, if that Slytherin had not acted quickly and more importantly, correctly. He suspected that Mr. Snape could cast the Killing Curse, but didn't, even when Miss Evans was in mortal danger. The students also took particular care to protect Hogsmeade when they escaped, rather than letting Lupin free to terrorize the village during the night. "I'll take that address and pay a personal visit," Albus said, his mind made up. "I'm growing rather fond of Mr. Snape and his quiet protest against the wrongs around him. That article in The Quibbler still gives me a warm feeling in here," he said while thumping the center of his chest with his hand. Mr. Snape had also been the only student to successfully and repeatedly stand up against the four Gryffindor Marauders. Repeatedly, when the Headmaster himself discouraged it, allowing them to terrorize the rest of the students. If only Severus Snape had been sorted into Gryffindor where he belonged.

******************************************

Prior to returning to school, James spent his spare time alternating between trying to reach Sirius with the mirror and looking at the map of the school. Padfoot had to have been joking. A very poor joke, but joking nonetheless. Christmas after next in Paris? He'd have a date with James' fist first.

The map. Well, the map was becoming an increasing obsession with James. So he noticed Evans with Snape in a ladies' room. But then he saw them together in the library. And then in Ravenclaw tower. They were together all over the school, and a lot of the time they were alone.

Over the past week, James began to take notes. He forgot about the other Slytherin Death Eaters.

Snape was luring Evans into using the Dark Arts with him, and maybe MacDonald too. Those poor girls. They might be werewolves, but there was no reason that they had to turn evil like Snape. Just look at Remus. He was a great guy. Decent and a true friend … James' eyes welled up. Remus was a true friend, and he had let him down. Sirius too, but James could have told Filch. Demanded to see the headmaster. Something. Anything. Remus was in Azkaban.

James got a hold of himself and blew his nose. He had to pull himself together and help Evans and MacDonald. Remus would want him to do that. Once someone started using the Dark Arts, there was nothing nor no one that mattered to them anymore. Sure, they could seduce others into trying them and to be their accomplices, but if Evans or MacDonald thought Snape even liked them, they were in for a rude awakening. He'd betray them in a heartbeat.

After a last failed attempt to take the invisibility cloak back to school, James was ready, although he continued muttering that he would waste away to nothing unless he could sneak down to the school kitchens for a snack whenever hunger pangs overtook him during late night study sessions.

His parents and him flooed to the Headmaster's office. They were invited to sit until Peter arrived, and the Pettigrews did not keep them waiting long.

Peter's eyes immediately lit up when he saw James and he rushed over to him, "James, my good friend. You don't know how much I've missed you."

James was a bit surprised by how strong and heartfelt Peter's embrace felt. To be truthful, Peter had hardly been on James' mind at all during the suspension. He knew he was at home, but he wasn't in any trouble like Remus or Sirius.

******************************************

The night finally arrived when Lily would know once and for all whether she was a werewolf or not. She hadn't told Severus or anyone about her desire to eat raw chicken. Rare beef was bad enough, but her mental denial that she could get terribly ill from it made her sure that she had to have lycanthropy.

At first, it was only going to be Prof. McGonagall and Mrs. MacDonald inside with the two of them. Mary and her had separate cages. Once they were out of their clothes and covered up with blankets, Mr. MacDonald, the headmaster and Severus were allowed in. Prof. Dumbledore had given his assent when both Mary and Lily assured him they would not mind Severus being present. Lily did not mention that Severus had already seen all her sights.

Severus gave a nod to MacDonald when he entered, and took the chair closest to Lily, sliding it up against the bars. He could move back during her transformation. Quietly he asked, "Did you want to see a clock with the time left till moon rise?"

"I don't know if I could bear that, Sev."

"It's up to you."

"Uh, alright, but keep it small and low. I don't want to get Mary worried."

Severus took out his wand, gave it a subtle and wordless wave, and there was now a countdown on the floor between them. He kept his wand out, in case Lily wanted the clock gone or anything else.

Albus noticed the timing charm. When Atlas said his student improvised, it was a gross understatement. Wizards did construct timepieces that measured various movements of the celestial bodies, but the rising of the moon with respect to Hogwarts by incorporating the apparition coordinates of this spot, if one could apparate here, was incredibly precise.

They looked into each others' eyes like they did so often, with increasing glances at the time left. After nervously checking that her blankets were securely covering her, Lily placed her hands on the bars. Severus stood, placed his wand on the chair and put his hands on the bars of their protective enclosure around the door. No more than eight feet separated them.

Severus and Lily did not take their eyes off the other. The countdown stopped at 0:00:00 and began to flash in a blinking effect without any sound on the floor between them. Mary MacDonald screamed loudly before making tortured noises that deepened in pitch. Lily swallowed, then blinked and resumed breathing. Her eyes dropped to the clock on the floor, then back to Severus before she let her eyes, then her head turn slowly towards Mary. Silently at first, Lily began to cry.

******************************************

The following evening, Albus apprarated, feeling a bit selfish and greedy. He missed when he used to visit families of students. Sadly, it was Minerva who now had the privilege of visiting the homes of newly admitted muggleborn students to explain Hogwarts and the magical world, and how special their children were.

After he visited with the Snapes, he was going to the Evans, who lived nearby, to let them know that Lily was not a werewolf. It would be an immense relief, he was sure. He'd also let them know more details about her cursed wounds and her craving for different foods, notably rare steaks.

Albus looked at the sluggish river that emitted a foul odor even in winter, and got his bearings. He turned away from it and headed for a gap in the low iron railing that separated the cobbled street from the river. The narrow streets were warren-like due to the attached brick housing, but Albus' superb sense of direction got him to the sign indicating he had found Spinner's End. There was more than one house here, and none of them bore an identifiable number on its exterior, or a mailbox with a last name. He took the parchment out of his pocket to refresh his memory. It simply said Spinner's End.

He took a slow turn around while stroking his beard. No one appeared to be visible, and the one street lamp that was in operation was sputtering. Some windows had light within, but all were rather dim. Someone should pass shortly since it was approximately dinner time, and he assumed people would be returning home from their jobs. Hmm, for a muggle street, there were no automobiles. It was narrow, but surely it was wide enough for one to pass through it.

"Oi! Ya duffer! What da fuck are ya lookin' to buy?"

Albus blinked, trying to focus on the lad, who couldn't be older than a first year, that had yelled at him so boisterously from the shadows. "Thank you, young man."

From the number of young laughs, Albus realized his compatriots were near, but rather good at hiding.

"I am in need of directions to the Snape household."

All laughing stopped. "He ain't sellin' nuttin'. Ya lookin' to take a trip?"

"I've recently arrived here."

"Shoot up?"

"No thank you, I'm only interested in finding the Snape household."

He could hear a scurrying of feet, rather than see the lads run away. They might have gone into that alley. Perhaps if he could explain since he had a rather good rapport with young children. Unafraid, Albus entered the dark narrow alley and could hear something ahead. It didn't sound like children, he approached, calling, "I say there ..."

Someone growled, "Fuckin' wait your turn."

"Oh pardon me," Albus replied, backing up. It was a couple fornicating against a brick wall outside in December in a refuse strewn alley. That was rather unexpected.

He approached the front doors of one of the homes. One with lit windows and the sounds of children inside, and knocked.

The door was ripped open violently, "I told ya … Waddya want?"

Before Albus stood a woman who had obviously fallen upon hard times. She had a lit cigarette hanging out of her mouth, her hair in rollers, many layers of cosmetics on her face, and her oversized dress was hanging off her emaciated frame, openly exposing more than was decent, with a large purple and yellow mottled bruise upon the top of her breast. Tipping his hat respectfully, he said, "Pardon me, madam. Perhaps you could assist me. I am looking for the Snape household."

The old whore's eyes rolled wildly as she took in the sight of the elderly gentleman in front of her. An eccentric bloke with gray hair down to his arse and a beard equally as long, wearing a purple pin-striped suit with a lavender shirt with matching handkerchief in the breast pocket, and a bold, orange flower with red and yellow spots, in the buttonhole. Although she did not use the word codger often, this fellow with spats and all was definitely a codger. Without removing her cigarette from her lips, she aggressively asked, "What for?"

"I only wanted to talk to them about their son."

Albus got a sudden flash of memory from the woman's eyes. Severus lived next door and she watched him urinate in the back garden … frequently. She thought he was disabled in some way, like his mother, and he went to a government school. The woman gasped angrily, "How dare you? Fancy faggot like you comin' round here lookin' to take poor boys in." Albus backed away from her doorway when she picked up a length of metal pipe and came after him with it. "You reekin' poofter, ya better run. I hope ya tonker falls off, ya filthy child-touchin' tosser. Lousy toffs comin' down here after our childrens. I'll get the law on ya. They lock up your kind now. Not like them in the old days."

He barely got around the corner and disillusioned himself when she came around it, waving the pipe wildly with her house slippers loudly slapping against the cobbles. Windows and doors were opening as some of the residents investigated the racket she was making. While sticking to the shadows, Albus investigated the exterior of the unlit and apparently uninhabited Snape house here at the end. No doors or windows were open, even in response to the commotion. The back of the house was equally dark and lifeless.

Still at work, out for the evening, not living here, hiding from their neighbors … all possibilities. Perhaps he should go to the Evans' first and inquire. Albus had thought it would be a nice surprise, but supposed he could always ask Severus directly where his parents were, if the Evans did not know.

The other home was within walking distance so he struck out in that direction. Although he had failed so far, that had been rather exhilarating in a sort of brush with muggles sort of way. He had no idea what the lads and most of what that woman had been saying, except that she suspected he was involved with some illegal activity with children, but that neighborhood certainly was … feisty. Perhaps that's where young Severus got his questioning attitude. Not a single person answered his simple question of which was the correct house. His mouth quirked thinking about a spy novel he had enjoyed. Information was given strictly on a 'need to know' basis. He did not pass their test.

As he strolled along the more spacious streets, with houses nicely spaced with neat gardens surrounding them, Albus noticed some of the muggles had set out their outdoor holiday decorations. They were so inventive. Later in the month, this neighborhood would probably be a real feast to the eyes.

Once again, Albus found the correct street with no difficulty. This area had the houses clearly numbers in a consecutive fashion. What a relief. Though he was reconsidered that lad's offer of a trip. He should have inquired what destinations were available.

He found the correct house, including young Petunia who had written him that lovely letter. Obviously she did not appreciate his kind reply since he heard her mutter 'freak' at him multiple times. She flounced up the stairs while Albus discussed Lily's fortunate turn of events with her parents over tea, but he saw her shoes clearly standing on the top step.

"Lily is most fortunate to have a friend like Severus Snape by her side," he continued, after a not so subtle snort came from the top of the stairs. "She and her classmate, Miss MacDonald, could easily be dead now. He was resourceful and also gave consideration to those living in the area, by not loosing the werewolf on the nearby village when they made their escape."

"Severus is a good boy," Mrs. Evans said with genuine appreciation.

"Resourceful doesn't begin to describe him," Mr. Evans agreed. He may not have cared for the image his Lily gave while traipsing about town with the Snape boy every summer, but he had absolute faith in his wife's judgment of his character. Living by the river did not mean one would grow up to be a vagrant or criminal. That's what made Britain one of the greatest countries in the world, hence his little joke of why it was named Great Britain.

"There was to be a little award ceremony, but the school's been having difficulty reaching his parents."

The response to Albus' statement was polite silence. If he didn't know better, he'd think there was some conspiracy to hide these two people. Lily Evans' parents seemed like forthcoming muggles, and if they were the type to ask a lot of questions, they surely would have during his explanation of Lily's attack, her injuries, and the fact that her wounds were cursed to not heal completely and that she'd crave rare meat and perhaps some other food items. He continued, "I thought I had found their residence by the river, but no one was in."

"Oh," Mrs. Evans replied, "yes, they live in Spinner's End."

"Yes, that's where I was."

"Hmm," she said while nodding, giving a small glance to her husband.

He joined her with nodding, and also agreeably replied, "Hmm."

A snigger burst out at the top of the stairs, so Albus tried, "Is there some information you could give me to help locate them?"

The snickering got louder. Mr. Evans glanced at the stairs first, then sighed. "I suppose this early in the evening, Mr. Snape may still be out."

Mrs. Evans nodded.

"I can give you the direction of where he may be."

"Couldn't you show ..." Mrs. Evans began to suggest.

"No, uh," Mr. Evans gave Albus' attire a very pointed look, "I'm sure he can find it on his own." He also did not want to be seen leading such … a personage … straight to Tobias Snape. They didn't move in the same social circles so the explanation may not … well, he didn't like the man, and frankly he was somewhat scary, had a flash temper and was prone to violence, and not only towards his son.

Mr. Evans gave Albus clear directions on how to reach this pub. He rather imagined something like the Hog's Head from his reluctance to escort him here. Everyone knew the Hog's Head, but not everyone wanted to be seen there. It was rather silly. Aberforth wouldn't hurt a fly. Most of the time, he corrected himself while rubbing his nose.

Albus entered. It was wonderful. So … so exciting. There were a lot of people in here, and they were all watching the same sporting match on the uh … tel … tel boxes? He became mesmerized by the rolling black and white ball and was amazed when it was announced this game was being played live in another location. Absolutely incredible what muggles could accomplish.

He noticed some of the patrons giving him stares. No one had a beard as prodigious as his. That must be it. He had been informed that Severus' father did not look like his son, so this was going to be a bit of a challenge, but he had the general description. A big fellow with very short, graying black hair. Hmm, quite a few men fit that description. He was studying them a little more closely when he noticed the fellow behind the bar, wearing a stained apron was beckoning in his direction. Albus raised his hand questioningly to his own chest. The barkeep nodded.

Deciding he had nothing to lose, Albus went over and with a smile held out his hand. The man shook it, and asked, "I noticed you were dressed sort of like the insurance adjusters that were here over the summer."

"Insurance adjuster?"

"Yes," he answered with an obvious wink. "When those lads came in here and vandalized the place."

"Oh, yes," Albus answered. This was that pub. The one that Black and Potter had attacked muggles in.

The man insisted with a wave of his hands at the bar, "Everything is good and works fine."

"That's wonderful to hear. I'm not with uh, that insurance company. I work at another firm and I was wondering, could you point me in the direction of Tobias Snape?"

"Tobias?" the owner repeated, quickly thinking through possibilities, but he stayed cool. These wizard folk were rather dull, even with their posh, uh, nancy boy clothes. "Yes. Would you rather use the store room over there," he indicated by pointing his finger, "to talk to him? It's a bit loud in here with the match on. When Manchester scores, you'd think their yells were loud enough to blow the roof off this joint."

"Oh, could I, or we, please use your storage room? That would be lovely."

"Sure, just let me see if I can get his attention."

Albus looked in the direction that the man was gesturing in. There were a lot of big men over there. All with haircuts so short that they barely had any hair left. When a man finally turned his head to look at the bartender who now yelled, "Tobias," Albus knew it was him. The way he sneered in their direction was just like an expression he saw on Severus' face in the Great Hall daily.

To him, the barkeeper said, "You go head in. He's coming."

Albus went around to the side to get to the store room. He glanced over his shoulder and saw that Mr. Snape was exchanging a few words with the kind proprietor before following him.

Tobias entered the store room and closed the door, studying the elderly wizard before him. He was easily recognizable by his eccentric clothing and their fondness for long hair and beards, which easily exceeded the disgusting hairstyles of hippies and beatniks.

The man's blue eyes were similar to his own father's when he was angered, Albus thought in passing, before beginning to introduce himself by warmly extending his hand and saying, "Mr. Snape, you're rather hard to track down."

"Really?" Tobias replied in his deep voice.

"Well, here we are. I'm Albus Dumbledore, headmaster of Hogwarts."

Tobias took his hand briefly and strongly, and simply said, "Yes."

"Your son attends my school."

"I know."

"Severus and some other students were in a perilous situation. He showed remarkable bravery and saved at least two lives that night. His quick thinking probably prevented other injuries also."

"Was Severus injured?"

"No, he's fine."

"Alright. Is that all?"

"There's going to be an award ceremony. I can arrange for you to attend."

"What do I care for awards? I have a drawer full of them. They never did me any good. How will it do any good for Severus?"

Albus opened his mouth to reply when he accidentally got a horrifying image in his mind of muggle warfare. Men screaming, smoke, bodies torn apart, the whistling of some sort of high velocity, incoming ammunition with a younger Tobias Snape dragging another soldier to safety while the earth around them erupted into towering plumes. It rendered him momentarily speechless.

He swallowed and took a deep breath. "Severus is an extraordinary student, Mr. Snape."

Tobias sneered at him, "Don't lie to me. I know he's not a prefect. Out of five boys, he's not the best. That is not extraordinary. It's ordinary."

"Oh no, he's very bright and talented. Severus is taking seven advanced classes."

"That means nothing to me. Good evening."

Albus asked as Tobias opened the door, "What about your wife, Eileen?"

"She won't be attending either." Tobias glanced back, and asked, "What is the name of this award? I'll let her know."

"Order of Merlin, Third Class."

"Third Class?" Tobias repeated with a smirk, and exited to go back to watching Manchester defeat West Ham.

******************************************

AN: I don't think strict believers would allow their children to go to Hogwarts, even with the assurance there is no devil worship. There has to be some muggle families that are casual church goers that have magical children. The mainstream population is not comprised of atheists and agnostics.


	33. Chapter 33 Not Even a Finger was Left

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 33 Not Even a Finger was Left Behind

At first, Peter thought becoming James' best friend would be easy and painless. It was easy. That much was certain with just the two of them rooming together, and all evidence of Remus and Sirius removed from their room. There was enough floor space now that they could invite some girls up to listen to the wireless and dance.

James was different. He cried. Not just when he wrote a letter to Remus either. It was rather Peter's own fault because he was trying to imitate the spontaneous way that James or Sirius would suddenly put their arm around the other's shoulder. James would hug him back, say something nice and start weeping. Not all the time, but enough that Peter stopped touching him. Marauders did not cry. They made others cry.

The only shadow of the former Prongs that Peter could see was when James told him of their new Marauder mission. It was so stupid. James wanted to save MacDonald and Evans from Snape, who was teaching them the Dark Arts. Actually, it was beyond stupid. James and Peter could only beat Snape if they attacked him while he was sleeping, and that would probably be a close thing. Prongs' plan was to gather information about his use of the Dark Arts and to get him expelled or worse, not attack Snape without provocation. First off, that sounded incredibly dull. The other problem that Peter saw with the plan was that he and James should stay away from MacDonald and Evans. Without Sirius, they were the prime targets for their revenge. If they wanted to learn the Dark Arts, it was to use them on Potter and Pettigrew, not to join up with the Death Eaters.

After dinner, James was excited. Tonight was the full moon. After checking the map, he made sure he was presentable … well, more than presentable. This was a big night. Peter would see. Their waiting would pay off once MacDonald and Evans found out that they could keep them company.

James stared at the map, waiting for Madam Pomfrey to take them out to the Whomping Willow. She was in the Infirmary. James kept checking his watch. Wasn't it getting rather late? What were Evans and MacDonald doing? He saw them earlier today.

He ran his finger slowly away from the Infirmary. They'd never make it in time now. Lower, lower, into the dungeons … there they were. Prof. Dumbledore, Prof. McGonagall, MacDonald's parents and Snape were there with them. What the hell was Snape doing there? James watched. Soon, everyone became absolutely still, except for MacDonald who was turning in tight circles. MacDonald spun nonstop for close to ten minutes, before Evans walked over to Snape.

Prof. McGonagall joined them and they exited that room. Near the Slytherin dungeons, Snape parted from them. It was just Evans and McGonagall now, and it looked like they were heading up here.

James glanced back at MacDonald. Her feet were still moving, but going nowhere.

To Peter, James jubilantly declared before he ran down the stairs to the common room, "Evans is coming up. She's not a werewolf!"

Peter replied to the empty room, "So?" Prongs was an idiot when it came to Evans. Well, he was an idiot about most everything these days. He took the map from where James left it, and put it in his pocket, then transformed into a rat. Prongs was going to be no fun tonight.

James paced the common room till Evans came in through the portrait hole.

"Evans!" he exclaimed, heading over her. James then noticed she looked blotchy with bloodshot eyes, even with the greenish skin.

"What do you want, Potter?" she snapped.

"Did Snape do something to you?"

"Snape? What is it with you? You are the densest toerag in existence. I just came from a cage in the dungeons, you … you … dunderhead. It's the first full moon since your little prank."

"That's good, right? You're not a werewolf."

Lily's lip curled and she looked at Potter in disgust. "I might not be, but Mary MacDonald is. Or would you prefer us all dead?"

"How could you say that, Evans? I tried to save uh … you."

"Funny, I don't recall seeing you there. From that article in the paper, it sounded like you were having a laugh with your mates."

"I wasn't. I was outside waiting for Snape."

"Waiting to do what? _Stupefy_ him and then call Lupin?"

"No, I never wanted to get Remus in trouble. I would have stopped him."

With a disgusting exhale of breath, Lily replied, "You are such a liar, James Potter. Don't talk to me."

James couldn't let her head up the stairs without telling her how he felt. He didn't care if there was an audience watching them now. "But Evans, if you're not a werewolf, don't you see? We can go out."

Lily turned and her mouth dropped open in shock. She shut it so hard, her teeth clicked, and she kept them tightly closed as she gritted out, "Go out? I wouldn't go out with you if you were the last boy on earth, and the entire future of the human race depended on it."

"Evans! I mean Lily … you and I would be perfect together."

"Perfect?" she growled, "You're a perfect pisshead that shouldn't even be in school still. I don't care who your parents are and how much they paid to keep you here. There is no price that can be put on the lives of others."

"You need to calm down."

"Calm down. Oooh!" Lily continued back up the stairs in a terrible mood. She could not believe how incredibly thick-headed and conceited James Potter was. If she stayed in the common room a moment longer, she'd start jinxing.

James knew that didn't go well. Evans was upset over MacDonald. This was the part where Sirius would say something like 'tough luck, Prongs', but he wasn't here. Everyone in the common room, even the lads, looked at him. Rather hostile looking. Maybe he should see what Peter thought of this.

He went back to his room, but Peter and the map were gone.

***********************************

Mary spent her days during the full moon in the infirmary. She felt wrung out, and would not be able to attend classes till Monday. When she was alone, Mary cursed Remus Lupin. How could he commit someone else to this torment? Black, Potter and Pettigrew were untrustworthy and sadistic fiends, they were as monstrous on the inside as Lupin was during the full moon. Lupin was aware they knew where he was during his unsupervised transformations. All he needed to do was say something to Madam Pomfrey or Prof. Dumbledore, but he didn't. He didn't because he was a werewolf in his heart too, there was as much humanity left in him as there was in the rest of the Marauders.

Madam Pomfrey did her job, but nothing more. Mary was studying her carefully. She knew that Lupin was left outside alone. For all the feigned interest in the safety of the students, Pomfrey could have done something. Lupin may not have told her that his safety was compromised by students knowing where he was, but to expect no one to stumble across him in seven years from either Hogwarts or Hogsmeade was the height of foolishness.

Lily was a constant visitor outside class. Mary was interested in knowing what was going on in class. Divination was moving into comparative symbolism and analysis. They were being taught methods in preparation for another large assignment over the Christmas holiday. Lily and her had speculated on what their first major project would be. Mary's hopes were on a compatibility comparison. Severus' chart was already compiled by Lily, and even though the subject was unnamed, it was available for other students in the class to review. Especially since it was part of what the professor called a perfect example of predictive divination, so far.

Mary hoped that would be the assignment. Lily could also do one of her and Severus. When Lily was visiting her without Severus, Lily had confided that she was developing feelings for Severus, but did not know what to do since she did not want to lose either Mary or Severus as a friend. At first, Mary was upset, but if there was someone likely to compete with her for Severus, it was Lily. It was good fortune that her and Lily were such good friends and could be honest with each other. Some other girl might be a spiteful tramp and try to catch Severus' attention in order to hurt him, or even Mary or Lily. It was hard to believe, but girls like that existed, and not only in Slytherin. Anyway, if they both did comparative charts matching their own with Severus', it could clear things up without it getting ugly. Besides, Mary did not think Severus would understand them competing for him. He seemed utterly clueless to her suggestions, and was quite restrained when Lily drunkenly demanded he shag her rotten and leapt upon him. It had to have been his own body and fears that kept him in such tight control. Once he shagged, he'd feel differently about it. Mary knew she sure did.

Since it was a non-Divination day, Severus was visiting with Lily today. They had discussed it, and Severus could use the time on Arithmancy, while the ladies talked about the superior method of divining the truth. One could not let their life be ruled by numbers and equations. That was ridiculous, or at least in Mary's and Lily's opinion, which were the ones that counted. It was bad enough that horoscopes had them using base 60 math, but luckily there were charms that did those calculations.

They were talking about Defense when Madam Pomfrey interrupted them, "Mr. Snape, I find I have time in my schedule and I'd like to give you a complete physical." It had been eating away at her that this boy had hoodwinked St. Mungo's and the Ministry into thinking there was something wrong at the school. She'd expose him for the fraud he was.

His lip curled up and he responded, "What for? No one's cast anything on me in days."

"Some of the students' records were tampered with, and need to be updated."

Severus' brow furrowed. Did he even have anything in a record to be tampered with? "Alright. Go ahead and cast whatever."

"I need you to get undressed first. Come ..."

"I've never gotten undressed for you before. I'm not doing it."

Mary and Lily were equally confused and concerned. Madam Pomfrey used magic. She didn't have students strip down. They certainly never did.

"No arguments, Mr. Snape. You'll have a detention every night until you cooperate."

"Alright."

"Well, come on then. I haven't got all afternoon."

"I'm not wasting your time. I opted for the detention," Severus replied with a smirk.

Once a very cross Madam Pomfrey was out of earshot, he asked, "Am I right in thinking no other students need to get undressed for her?"

Mary laughed, "Now you ask?"

"No, Sev, they don't. That's a lot of detention for standing up for what you think is right," Lily said concerned because he had so much homework.

He shrugged, "It's seventeen months, at most, not counting the summer holiday."

"You're not going to serve detention for seventeen months," Lily replied.

"Oh, did I change my name to Potter?" Severus asked airily. When Potter and Pettigrew got suspended, their detentions stopped and Gryffindor was restored to zero points. With the loss of Parkin, their quidditch scores were not going to save them, and they'd be lucky to hit an even hundred points by June. Potter would probably be restored to the quidditch team to save them too. His 'probation' did not get him tossed out of school, so there no reason that the ban given at the same time shouldn't be lifted also.

"Just take off your clothes," Lily argued.

"No, he shouldn't have to," Mary countered. Lily should try to be a little understanding of Severus' feelings on the matter. It wasn't as simple as disrobing for him.

Lily glared at Mary. This didn't involve her. She was only taking Severus' side, which was the wrong one, to kiss up to him.

"She did not agree to any conditions, Lily. Examined by just her, or others?"

"What?"

"You at least agree it is an unusual request?"

"Yes, but …"

"Why not in the courtyard? Or the Great Hall during dinner?"

"That would be wrong," Lily replied.

"Like something being wrong stopped it from happening at Hogwarts. If you are concerned about my health, you know I had a totally undressed examination at St. Mungo's, and until recently one of their healers were seeing us every week. Today, Madam Pomfrey wants to fix her records? She never did any sort of examination on me before."

Mary said, "Not to me either. If she was so bored, why not have me strip? I'm right here every morning now. She accepted what St. Mungo's said about me, without reexamination."

"I don't think you should make trouble," Lily stubbornly insisted.

"It's not right. What says that any staff can't tell any student to take off their clothes?"

"What?"

"I think it would be fair to ask for them to turn out their pockets, but there should be a student code of rights that would require a parent or same gendered head of house to be present, it to be done in a private area, and there should be some sort of limit or reasonable explanation given to allow it."

"Where do you come up with this stuff, Sev?" Lily asked. Teachers telling students to take off their clothes? It was only Madam Pomfrey.

"Ugh, can you imagine? What if it's like Prof. Pettigrew teaching … oh, whatever, he's not really good at anything is he? Well, you got the caster of the Breast Baring Jinx as a teacher, and able to tell any female student he wants to strip?" Mary asked.

"That would never happen. A Marauder teach here? Never," disagreed Lily.

"Dumbledore may act like he's wised up, but with a death and the Board he has to," Severus said. "However, he loves them. They might have hit a rough patch, but they tell him some tale, and how sorry they are, and I guess only Pettigrew would need the money, so he gives him a job. Maybe assistant to Filch, since he can't teach anything."

Beady little eyes narrowed in anger underneath one of the beds. Assistant to Filch? That's rich coming from Snape. Peter could come back for Little Miss Smartass MacDonald later, or even next month. Evans would get tired of visiting her.

***********************************

A bit after dinner, Severus went up to the headmaster's office, after arranging things with Mr. Filch. At least Slughorn was back to normal and not pretending to invite him to tea. Severus knew he had to have gotten a few black marks against him since Madam Pomfrey did not normally hand out detention.

When he entered the office, he thought he really didn't need this shit. Besides Dumbledore and Slughorn, Abstractus, McGonagall and Flitwick were here too, with some Ministry jerk in a pinstriped suit. What now? There was a fake galleon in the twelve he paid for his apparition class?

Severus supposed not because Abstractus, McGonagall, Flitwick and Dumbledore were smiling at him. Rather than explaining what nonsense they were up to, they waited expectantly after greeting him with their teeth showing.

When that blond reporter woman that Lily was so taken with arrived with a photographer, he started feeling sick to his stomach. Horrible things were about to happen, and Dumbledore announced its commencement with, "Ah, Miss Skeeter, a pleasure, as always. I suppose we're ready to begin then."

Albus had decided to keep things small, considering no familial support and Mr. Snape's lack of popularity among the students would result in catcalls rather than applause. He cleared his throat and picked up a stained piece of wood, "It's not every evening that one comes face to face with imminent death, but it's how one responds to such an occasion, with concern for others that brings us here today. For bravery and clear thinking, Severus Snape is awarded with this Award for Special Services to Hogwarts."

Dumbledore held it out to him. Was Severus supposed to carry it down to the trophy room for his detention? He took it in one hand and asked, "What is this good for?"

"Good for?"

"Like getting out of detention?"

From the way they laughed at him, obviously Severus Snape was the dunderhead in this room. Yeah, he thought as he laid it down where Dumbledore picked it up from his desk, nothing like a good laugh at his expense. And they were supposed to be the adults.

"And that's not all, as I'm sure you've already suspected. Mr. Crouch is here on behalf of the Ministry."

Severus looked at Barty's father. He really looked like his son said. Severus' shoulder twitched at how inhumanely precise, was that the word, yes, precise he appeared. This is the man who allowed the Ministry to cast Unforgivables and said they were not be accountable to anyone. The head of Magical Law Enforcement and above the law, and anyone he chose to be above the law. What a fine role model, he thought sarcastically.

"Yes, thank you, Dumbledore," he said. He looked like a man who had better things to do. Hopefully, he'd be quick about it and then Severus could get out of here.

"Due to public demand that some notice be given to the student who's sound thinking prevented further terrible mishaps, I am awarding you, on behalf of the Minister, the Order of Merlin, third class."

Severus stood completely still. Although it was highly unlikely, this fellow could cast the Killing Curse at every one of them in the room, and not give a damn. He was efficient with pinning it to his robe. Crouch must do this a lot since he hadn't even bothered to say his name. Just speak, pin and go.

He took the case from Crouch, who was holding it out to him, and unpinned the award and put it away. "Is this it?" Severus asked, holding the closed case in front of him.

"Yes, that's the award."

"Nothing else?"

"Such as?"

Severus could think of many things much more useful than this. The Ministry could have waived the twelve galleon fee for his apparition course. That would have been a damned sight better than this thing. However, Severus merely shrugged. He did not want the attention of this man, even if it was under the pretense of something good.

While Crouch remained the center of attention as he made his farewells, Severus put the worthless medal down with the plaque. This was a complete fucking waste of time. He had no idea how long Filch was going to keep him tonight, and he had things he needed to complete. Severus did not spend his evenings lounging around the common room in silk pajamas. If that were the case, than hobnobbing with the toffs in the head's office would be a delightful change of pace.

It got to be too much for him when the smiles were followed by hands and arms. They ignored his verbal warnings as he continued to twist free of their grasps at him. When he had backed up to the door, he decided to leave, rather than join the group pawing at each other for photos.

By the time Severus got to the dungeons, he was muttering to himself, and ready to jinx anyone who impeded him. He changed into his detention clothes, or what Lily knew as his summer holiday outfit. He didn't want to risk permanent ruination of his uniform for whatever Filch thought up, and got in a bit of homework before heading to the caretaker's office for his assignment. It wasn't so bad. He'd be redoing the grout in one of the boys' bathrooms, and Filch verbally told him how to do it, and supplied what he needed to do it by hand. Severus gave the task a bit of thought while he worked. There was certainly a spell to do grout, but he could understand Filch not wanting to share that because his usual detainees would be shooting it all over the place. There was some precision needed and the excess needed to be wiped up before it dried, or it would be an unsightly mess.

Filch seemed happy with his progress when he came to check, or at least he didn't complain. For him, that was something. Severus was not sure he could finish this whole room tonight. It needed a lot of work. He was going to have to regrout it all because the new grout was so much brighter than the old so there was no shortcut unless he could whiten the old.

Severus had a system going that was working for him, when the door opened again. He hoped Filch did not have much to say, and would let him continue without interruption. He felt if he finished this whole wall tonight, he'd have something to show to end the detention, besides being given the opportunity to look up the charm to do this more efficiently tomorrow.

There was a flash of bright light with a popping sound. A smug female voice said, "You ran out of there so fast, you didn't stay for a photo."

Severus looked back. It was that reporter, holding a notepad, and accompanied by some dodgy looking bloke with a camera. Filch would have his cat's kittens if he found him goofing off with her. "I need to work on this. This is a gents' so you should leave."

"When is your detention over?"

"I don't know."

"Do you do manual labor around the school often?"

"If it's part of detention."

"How many days of detention do you have?"

"I don't know."

"Every night?"

"That is what I was assigned."

"When I interviewed the other lads, they said you come from a poor family."

"If you say so," Severus replied. Lily would admire this woman's needless questions. He was grouting tile, for Merlin's sake.

"Do you feel you are unfairly given punishments that others may not receive?"

His lip quirked as he continued staring at the wall he was working on, but Severus replied, "I am not in a position to judge that."

"Do you think detention every evening for an unspecified period of time will effect your grades?"

"It may."

"Why are you assigned this detention?"

"I refused a request from a staff member."

"Wouldn't it be simpler for you to have complied?"

"It was an unusual request that I felt was inappropriate."

"Does the school administration support that request?"

"I don't know."

"Did a specific reason need to be stated when the detention was assigned?"

"I don't know."

"What's this?" asked Filch. The boy was still working and had made progress since his last visit, but there were two strangers in here who were definite distractions.

"Are you supervising this detention?"

"Yes. Who are you?"

"I'm Rita Skeeter. I was invited to the school to cover this boy receiving an Order of Merlin earlier this evening."

As long as he worked hard, Filch did not care what he had pinned to his chest. "So what do you want with him now?"

"Did he try to take the evening off from this labor?"

"No."

"What time does it end?"

"He's making progress. At the end of this wall, he can stop for the night." Unlike other workers, Snape actually got something accomplished. Filch knew this from previous detentions that all he needed to do was have this one work without other students.

"He will have detention tomorrow?"

"Yes, he's scheduled," Filch replied. With this nosy woman poking around perhaps the headmaster would change it.

"Do you know why he has detention?"

"Disobedience. What are all these questions for?"

"Just trying to get a little color for my story. He's not much of a talker."

"Good. I like workers, not talkers," Filch said, giving a very broad hint.

"Any beatings?" Pringle didn't spare the rod for her.

"They aren't allowed. Just the work," Filch replied miserably. "I think I've told you enough, and I want you to leave him to his work."

Bozo took a picture of Filch, who growled while Rita smirked at his discomfiture. What would really help any further article would be a likable student. Snape was hideous and boring. Rita was going to have to work hard to make him into someone for which the public could feel sympathy.

She left thinking about dear Prof. Slughorn. He gave a leg up to Barnabas Cuffe, and Cuffe got her staff position at The Daily Prophet, and made a lot of money on the side suppressing the news, instead of reporting it. If Cuffe was getting an award, Slughorn would have his fat arms all over him squeezing into the photo, but he avoided Snape this evening like he was still infectious with dragonpox.

Snape turned when he heard the door slam. Mr. Filch was staring at the closed door, rather than him. "Is this wall fine than, Mr. Filch?"

"Yeah, but don't get sloppy about it," he menaced, while examining the work on a completed portion. "And clean the bucket and rags before you stop for the night."

"By the way, Mr. Filch, I noticed what looked like rat droppings in the first cubicle. Since I'm not as familiar with the building as you are, and what vermin it could be, I left it for you to see before I cleaned it up."

Filch slammed the stall door open and looked down, exclaiming, "Filth! Feces on my floor!"

Afraid of Filch taking it out on him, Severus repeated, "I will clean it up, now that you've seen it."

Barely listening, Filch began talking to himself as he left, "Traps. Vermin in here. Check the kitchens."

Severus completed his work on the wall's grout, and disappeared the rat dropping and _scourgifyed _the floor. Filch would probably want him to clean it more, but no one was going to be eating in here. He checked the other stalls, including behind the toilets to see if there was any more. Even though Filch hadn't seen it this time, he'd probably blame Severus if any got left behind in here. He wasn't sure what house elves handled and what was Filch's domain.

***********************************

Lily's emotions were swirling her between opposing moods. Not speaking to Severus would not resolve how she felt. Even she had to admit that whatever they now had between them was more than they were in the past. She did not want to call her best friend her boyfriend, but Lily was doing things with him that should label him that and possibly more. Lily wanted a boyfriend; she just had trouble seeing Severus in that role. That bothered her, and Petunia's words haunted her. Lily wanted to snog and if she was in the mood, which she wasn't thankfully in today, shagging Severus would not be out of the question.

His detention was not cutting into their time together because Severus began at curfew with whatever Mr. Filch had for him. While Lily was not being affected, she thought he was being a stubborn git by not giving into Madam Pomfrey. What did it matter? She agreed that it was an unusual request, and as far as she knew unless a student had an obvious injury that needed inspection, they were not asked to disrobe by the school nurse. It did not help matters that Mary was voicing approval for Severus' decision. He did not need someone cheering his noncompliance because she was hot for him.

Then there were those awards. Lily found out by reading about it the next morning in the paper. Her first thought had been why Severus? There were five other people that entered the Shrieking Shack. However, she beat that green monster into submission considering that without Severus she'd be dead, Mary would be dead, and Lily wasn't sure about Wilkes and Rosier. If Severus had not disabled the werewolf, would they have seen it and ran? Besides stopping Mary's bleeding, he also got Helen's body out of there. If they were so stingy with awards that only one person could receive it, Lily supposed Severus was the best choice.

She was inclined to believe Severus did not know about them in advance. Nonetheless, his attitude was sorely lacking any pride in himself. He was not someone who was easily gladdened by his life, but his perception of their non-importance was sad. Lily agreed that two new things to add to the Hogwarts' overstuffed trophy room would be cursed by future generations of students in detention, and Severus could benefit more from … oh, anything. His suggestion of money sounded rather mercenary, but at least he could use that. Close behind his disturbing deficiency of self-worth was his speculation that the awards were merely for show to put a positive light on the incident. Dumbledore should bear responsibility for the easy access to a transformed werewolf, but here he was smiling and shaking hands with Crouch in the photo, with Slughorn beaming behind him. Severus was not even in the newspaper photo. Lily silently tried to rationalize that perhaps with his skin not back to a normal tone, that the black and white photo of Severus did not turn out well. Maybe it was for the best that Severus pretended he did not care. Lily felt a bit hurt for him, but if he was outwardly upset, she didn't know what she'd do. Her friend was used to disappointment, but that did not make it right.

Making things difficult was Potter, of all people. That damned toerag kept showing up in the library and hovering around them. Making things worse was Lily opened up her big mouth and told Severus to ignore him at first. Severus did, although Lily detected him shifting his eyes to keep them on Potter. After a couple evenings of Potter's pesting around, Lily was ready to jinx him herself. She had not been this annoyed in years, and that was when her family would take a long car trip, when Petunia would get bored and start poking her in the backseat. That's how juvenile Potter was acting. Didn't he have homework of his own to do?

Lily was relieved when Saturday finally arrived, and she could get Severus alone. They were sitting in the window looking towards the mountains from Ravenclaw tower. Rather than unloading all she wanted to say to Severus, Lily was being a bit naughty and was feeling the front of his trousers. Initially, she was not in the mood to kiss, snog or do anything more than merely enjoy some quiet time with Severus. He did not complain and while he was looking through a library book on household repair charms, Lily's hand walked over there on its own. She was looking at the book with Severus and found it somewhat interesting. Once she was seventeen, Lily could use some of these around her parents' home. It would save time and the cost of hiring someone. That is what she was thinking, until that little voice started urging her to pull down the tab of Sev's zipper. Lily was in the midst of ignoring it, even though she knew she had Severus thinking about more than roofing shingles, when Severus lifted his head and looked into the corridor, narrowing his eyes. He lowly said, "Someone's coming."

She turned her head to listen, but forgot to pay attention as she gripped Severus firmly and protectively in her hand. He pulled her hand off, muttering, "It could be a teacher." He put the book directly on top of his lap and drew his wand, holding it between them.

"Alright, Evans?" Potter asked when he came around the bend.

For what seemed to be the fiftieth time this week, Lily said, "Leave me alone."

Against his better judgment, Severus asked, "What are you doing, Potter?"

"Nothing."

Lily rolled her eyes.

"It's a bit cold out, would us locking you in a broom closet be alright with you, Potter?"

"Not without a fight."

"No fighting," Lily emphatically stated, although until Potter broke a rule, they may be stuck with him.

"Alright," Severus agreed. Could Lily be giving Potter yet another chance? A chance at what, Severus wasn't sure, but she was not helpless. He'd assist her, but if Severus took it upon himself to rid them of Potter, who apparently Lily was tolerating once again, who would she blame? Him, of course. Lily had been ticked at him all week over MacDonald, detention and bloody Dumbledore and his awards. Now Potter was being added to that stew. Posing, smirking and playing with his hair like the absolute jackass he was.

"Alright?" Lily repeated. She expected a lot more than 'alright' from Severus. Potter was being a first class toerag. She hated him. Yes, there was a very short list of people that Lily could not find anything worth … anything. There were a lot more people that she thought of as worthless, but Potter, Black, He Who Must Not Be Named, yeah, that was pretty much it, were so without conscience or morals that the world would be a much better place without them. They were simply that evil. Potter was not outwardly evil at the moment so courtesy dictated that she not harm him. Surprisingly, Severus was taking Lily's words to heart that he ignore all toerags. Maybe she shouldn't have stressed that lesson about being 'the better man' too much. She liked his idea about a broom closet, and then bricking over the door so Potter could not get out. Maybe with his precious Nimbus to keep him company for all eternity.

"Leave us alone," Lily insisted. "This following me around is highly immature."

"What?"

"Immature means you are acting like a child," Severus defined.

"I know what it means, Snivellus."

"You did ask."

"Someone's got to look out for Evans."

"I don't need you looking out for me, Potter," Lily said. This arguing was a waste of time.

"Yes, you do. The Dark Arts are dangerous. You'll lose your soul."

Both Lily and Severus repeated, "Dark Arts?"

"Leave me alone. You're being a pest," Lily warned Potter. Dark Arts indeed. Probably couldn't stand the fact that they were learning how to fix all the destruction Potter caused around the castle.

"But Evans, you can't trust Snivellus to … mmgh," Potter's tongue was now stuck to the roof of his mouth.

"Why do you bother trying to be reasonable with him?" Severus asked. Frankly, he was pissed at Potter finding them. The lack of interruptions after more than a month had made him feel quite comfortable with Lily here. Letting Potter know how angry he was would be a mistake. Calmly, he suggested, "Did you want to go visit Mary? After that, maybe we can see if there's any documentation regarding the digestive rates of werewolves. I stopped in after detention, and she was gnawing on that bone in that nest she made. That was after eleven."

Lily shrugged at Potter. Severus could have cast something much nastier on him. She would have, and was pretty close to it. She rose and picked up her nearly empty bag.

They were walking towards the stairwell, with Potter mumbling behind them, when Lily said, "Hold up a minute, Sev. Maybe he'll listen to me now." She took the book they had been looking at from Severus. "You stay here."

Potter's eyes lit up when Evans came over, and he smiled. Lily frowned, explaining, "Next time I'm going to Prof. McGonagall, Potter. We're looking at a book to repair things. Not the Dark Arts, you toerag. Severus Snape and I do a lot of things together, and have for years. I don't need you shadowing our every step, especially when we care about Mary MacDonald and are trying to help her. You following us up there, well … I don't think that would be right. Maybe next week, if you're sorry, you can try to speak to her, but this following around crap has got to stop. I'll hex you myself, and don't think I don't know some of your nasty Marauder spells." Calling to Severus, she asked, "Could you please remove the spell from him so he can say he understands, Sev?"

Severus would rather levitate Potter over the stair railing, but did as Lily requested reluctantly. It was better than showing her the reversal, in case he ever _langlock_ed her.

James had quite a bit to say. "Don't trust that slimy Slytherin, Evans. That greasy git is luring you in and then ..."

"Give it a break, Potter. I've known Severus longer than I've known you, and I've seen you cast more nasty spells than he does."

"But he's ..."

"I don't need ..."

"... using the Dark Arts ..."

"... you telling lies ..."

"... to get you ..."

"... and hurting people."

"... huh, I'd never hurt anyone."

"See, you can't even admit it. How many boys have you terrorized in the toilet? How many bums has Madam Pomfrey needed to sort? How many girls have you assaulted?"

"It's just fun. Snape is not having fun."

Lily scowled at Potter's reply. Werewolves were not fun. Potter may not have set up that prank, but whatever Black thought was funny, Potter laughed at.

"My idea of what's fun is quite different from yours, Potter," Severus hissed. There really was no darker shade of hate that he could paint Potter and Black. Lily's 'using your words' tactic was wasted on them. When someone is so full of thinking how superior they are, especially with the backing of people like Albus Dumbledore, himself a self-promoting son of a bitch, the injury or death of the unimportant was beneath their notice. Severus could kill Potter right now and sleep quite soundly tonight, if it wasn't for Lily. Potter was sorted into Gryffindor because he was a fat-headed showoff, not because he had the potential to save anyone's life. Not everyone sorted into Gryffindor contained even a smidgen of goodness. Despite proof to the contrary, Lily continued to believe that Potter and Pettigrew may be redeemable since they were allowed back in the school. He doubted them arranging another death would convince Lily otherwise, since he was quite sure she liked Helen Parkin. Maybe MacDonald could talk some sense into her.

On their way upstairs, Potter followed on an alternate staircase, talking loudly about the Dark Arts, or at least his perception of them. On a swinging stairwell, Severus gave Lily a questioning look. Potter was a certifiable idiot. Lily grinned when Severus made a talking hand gesture, that until now he only used when Petunia was talking on the telephone with one of her girlfriends.

Lily couldn't help smiling when Severus made fun of Potter's gabbiness. Hexing him off the stairs was more what she had in mind. At least Potter had the tact not to follow them inside to visit Mary.

***********************************

Peter had a lot of time on his hands. With the map, he was able to find Snape every night and watch hidden away as a rat, gloating about who in fact was Filch's assistant.

During the day, well, Peter did not have a full schedule of classes so that left him free to practice what he was best at … bullying first years. He stayed far away from Gryffindor tower since that fickle lot were no longer cheering his clever spells. There were at least a dozen boys from Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin to take his pick of.

He was interrupted from his enjoyment of a little Hufflepuff gurgling in the urinal by a bunch of older lads entering the gents'. Seeing Mulciber, Avery and an older Ravenclaw, Peter was relieved none of them was a Hufflepuff, but to be safe he let the young tyke go, meaning to follow the dripping crybaby out of the lavatory.

Mulciber blocked his path. "Pettigrew, I've been meaning to have a word with you ..."

***********************************

Mary had briefly considered asking her parents to let her stay at Hogwarts over the Christmas holiday with Severus and Lily. She was worried that Lily would take advantage of her time alone with him. However, Severus seemed so unconcerned about Mary's suggestions that he may not think of Lily like that either.

It was a bad idea anyway. Her parents wanted her home, and she wanted to be with them. She had written her parents about inviting Severus, and maybe Lily too, but although they understood Mary's anxiousness to find a replacement for Malcolm Wilkes, they felt she could do better. In the meantime, he was still greenish from dragonpox so there was no need to rush and throw herself at a pockmarked boy, even if he did save Mary's life and was now assisting to make her monthly transformations less stressful. Well, the first month at least.

Although Lily agreed that comparisons of Severus' birth chart to theirs might yield something, at times it seemed as if Lily did not mean to wait. Mary had seen her touch Severus' arm or grab his hand to get his attention. She had not noticed that before. Was that new? It could be jealousy that was making Mary pick a bone with Lily's interpretations for Severus. So far, Lily had been on the mark, and Severus failed to see any significance to Lily's predictions that had turned out truthful. Mary felt it was Arithmancy that blinded him, as if it was a stick that had poked out his inner eye. She certainly could not see any significance to that work. It was just filling a lot of parchment with scribbles.

On top of Mary's difficulties with Lily, Potter was being such a pest, Mary had to jinx him a few times out of frustration. Pettigrew too. She also used a lot stronger words for them than Lily's 'toerag'.

***********************************

Young Mrs. Norris was hot on the fresh trail of the rat thing that was in her castle. Her person was not as perceptive as her. He kept expecting a rat, but Mrs. Norris knew that the rat was not always a rat. He stank like a rat all the time. It was so obvious. When she found the rat thing, she snap his neck. Then everyone would know what a great hunter she was. Rats were for housecats, Mrs. Norris was no housecat and she'd prove it when she brought down this quarry.

She flicked her tail and trotted down the hallway silently. He had been this way tonight. His stench was fading, but Mrs. Norris knew there was a pattern to this rat thing's movements. She had listened well earlier tonight, and she knew who the rat thing was hunting. Silly rat thing thinking it was the hunter.

James telling Peter that he may not be welcome over at the Potters during the Christmas holiday due to James' parents was the absolutely last straw. If James really cared for Peter, he'd bend over backwards. Peter had seen James do that repeatedly for Sirius. Where was Sirius for James now? Expelled, somewhere in Europe traveling and having sex with his photogenic wife, and ignoring James pleading with the mirror. If James Potter wanted to be pathetic, he wasn't going to drag Peter Pettigrew down with him. Even Mary MacDonald was jinxing them now.

He needed friends that were really friends. Ones that would help him in the future. Mulciber and Avery were more honest than Potter and Black. If Peter wanted some opportunities to meet people and do things over the Christmas holiday, all he needed to do was show his sincerity. Peter had wasted five years palling up to the other Gryffindors, and they didn't appreciate it. Mulciber's candor was refreshing, and Peter could take his pick of Snape, Evans or MacDonald, and it would be up to Peter's own creativity. Something that he wasn't trusted with before. It was either Sirius' or James' idea that was always acted upon.

He wouldn't tell Mulciber and his new friends how he got around at night. That was his secret, and they'd never guess he was an animagus with a magical map of the castle. Peter would amaze them with his ingenuity and cunning.

Peter finished his trap on the archway lintel. He had pried it loose and then put it back into place with a sticking charm so when he released it, gravity would take over. The sticking charm wouldn't keep it up there long, however Peter needed something that could be quickly dispelled. He transformed back into a rat to hide. He waited twitching his whiskers in anticipation. This was right on so many levels. Snape had broken up the Marauders, got Sirius expelled, got Lupin sent to Azkaban. and James was a sobbing nancy boy now. Snape would be a perfect transition from his old friends to his new and better ones.

The greasy git was coming down the hall now. He was dressed in filthy muggle clothing. Merlin, James was absolutely right. He was worth killing just for the mere fact that he existed. His nasty whore of a mother slept with a muggle, and did not chuck his mewling form in a bin within minutes of emerging from her festering, diseased body. Disgusting.

Once he passed the niche where Peter was hiding and began work on the first window, he transformed and checked for prefects in the area on the map. Perfect. He wiped the map and put it away, holding his wand ready for Snape to finish caulking the first window and move to the next one by passing under the arch where he'd have the loosened stone lintel drop on him, hopefully crushing his oily skull.

Damned half-blood was so glacially slow. Filch wasn't watching him, just throw some caulk up and go on. Come on, come on, come on. Peter didn't have all night to wait on Snape, and he was too far away to reapply the sticking charm precisely to keep that stone up there. Could he know that Peter was here? To be safe, smaller and less noticeable, Peter resumed his rat form and nervously shifted his weight on his clawed paws while he waited, concentrating on how much he hated Snape. It was going to be so sweet. It wasn't going to be James or Sirius that finished him off, but Peter. Peter Pettigrew. He was getting all twitchy anticipating the look on James' face when he told him. Peter couldn't wait to race back to Gryffindor. Would he kill Snape outright, or would he be pinned to the floor like a helpless bug? Poor little, trapped Snivelly. Move it already. Merlin, he was slower than a lame house elf.

Out of nowhere, Peter was assaulted. The pain! He couldn't scream, but he squealed loudly. That filthy beast of Filch's grabbed him by the neck and was swinging him hard into the stone wall. Shit!

Severus had been finishing this window, which had so little of the old caulk left blocking out the cold air, it was a miracle the glass had not fallen out of the frame, when a high whining noise emitted from behind him. He turned, wand ready, and saw Filch's growling cat had caught the rat and was … punishing it? He had seen rats before, but down at the river, they were as large as cats, and were rarely alone. Severus _stupefy_ed it when he noticed Filch's cat was releasing it as she threw it against the wall. It seemed stunned, but it could easily be playing dead before running off and getting away. Filch wouldn't like that, and Severus would rather not have to clean up any more rat shit, or track down the odor of this one dying in the walls after the mortal wounds Mrs. Norris was inflicting upon it.

Feeling that he had better things to do than watch this, Severus went down the hall to the stairwell, and called, "Mr. Filch!"

Severus sighed when no one answered. Filch could be sneaking up on an out of bounds student or Peeves.

Returning to the cat and rat, he considered that if the cat would release it to him, he could either cage it or put it out of its misery. Or maybe not. Mrs. Norris growled menacingly when he approached, with her big eyes directly on him while holding the bedraggled rat down. Severus was not interested in taking her rat to eat, or take credit for catching it.

"Snape," called a female voice.

He looked. It was Shingleton, the fifth year Ravenclaw prefect and the younger sister of the Head Boy. Severus recognized her by the characteristic single eyebrow.

"I called for Filch because his cat's got a rat here."

"Oh?" she asked, then wrinkled her nose at it. "It's kind of big."

"Not really. This one's small, but rather fat. It might have been getting into the kitchens, unless the house elves were feeding it."

"Can't you … uh, do something?" she asked, backing away as Mrs. Norris flung the rat's body into the wall.

"That cat's rather mean. I don't want to fight her for it, but I stunned the rat earlier to keep it from getting away."

Looking around, she tried to talk about something other than a smelly rat, while they waited. So she brought up Snape's detention. "You still working on the windows?"

"Yeah."

She looked at the one that Snape had been working on, with Filch's step stool still set up in front of it, then paced to the next one in the corridor. The difference was easily seen. Marta strolled back to the gruesome scene, passing under the hallway's arch between the two windows. She made a face and asked, "Do you think it'll be alive much longer?"

"I don't know."

"Will she stop when it's dead?" she asked, turning around to pace a bit.

"I don't have a cat. I wouldn't know," Severus replied. Did all girls feel the need to senselessly talk? If Shingleton had nothing to help, why didn't she just shove off already?

Severus was considering returning to his detention work since she'd be around to watch the cat. He was turning to ask her if she was staying, when for no discernible reason, a large block of stone fell. It barely missed his head, but impacted with his shoulder knocking him backwards to the floor. The edge of the stone was weighing upon his ankle, but his foot may be alright considering his father's old boots had steel toes. It was definitely his ankle that hurt and there was pressure on the top of his foot, where the laces were, and there was no steel.

Shingleton was screaming. Since she was on the other side of the stone, Severus couldn't see how badly she was crushed so levitated the stone off them. Or off his foot. Shingleton was standing untouched on the other side of the archway, clutching her chest with one hand and waving the other around in the air. Yeah, wouldn't want to take out her wand and help him, would she? God damned useless Ravenclaw. In the excitement, she probably forgot Severus Snape was the victim, or she'd be laughing so hard she'd pee herself.

Rather than giving her a taste for how he felt right now, Severus moved the block to the side of the corridor, instead of onto her. This was one of those times he felt like crying. The physical pain was not as bad as that, but the pain coupled with the lack of basic concern for his welfare was agonizing. She felt more compassion for that rat, than him.

He was still examining his ankle when she said, "I think I need to go to the infirmary."

Not sure that he heard Shingleton correctly, he asked, "_You_ need to go?"

"Yes, for a calming draught or something. My heart is absolutely racing," she explained while still keeping her hand in the center of her chest.

Severus looked up at her from where he was sitting on the floor. Did she have some sort of heart problem? Crap. Why him? Severus thought to himself as he got up, believing his ankle just to be sore and probably have a lovely bruise tomorrow. Testing it, he could sort of stand.

"What about uh …?"

"If you need to go to the infirmary, I'll go with you," Severus replied. Who cared about a rat? If she keeled over in the hall, and he was the last one to see her, he'd be in deep trouble.

They slowly made their way up there, and Singleton explained her problem to Madam Pomfrey. At least Singleton had enough sense to deny Severus caused the accident when Pomfrey asked. Lovely is the only nice word that came to mind as Severus went back downstairs to clean up the items he left behind. Mrs. Norris and her rat were gone.

Mr. Filch was not in his office. Severus waited till he returned, rather than slinking off to bed. That stone could be a sign of something structural.

He also let him know about the cat. While sitting there, Severus had considered that without Lily, a cat or other animal might be the next closest thing to a friend he could find. Though he'd show a bit more decorum than Filch. And it sure as hell wouldn't be a cat. The rats at Spinner's End would gulp it down as an appetizer, if his mother didn't throw it in the pot to boil it up first.


	34. Chapter 34 Another woman to be jealous

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 34 Another woman to be jealous of

At first, James did not notice that Peter was missing. Since their suspension, Wormtail had been going off on his own with the map. The map was gone, so Peter must have it.

The evening before he missed class, James remembered seeing him before curfew in the Gryffindor tower. James had a lot of homework so he was not even sure if Peter was in bed or not by the time he turned in.

***********************************

Severus' shoulder and ankle were bruised, but his foot was fine. He could walk and hold his wand so no one would know that he had been injured and try to inflict more upon him.

Shingleton would know, but her self-absorption blinded her to others. Her older brother acted like a right ass by stopping him and putting on the Head Boy act, thanking him in the hallway in front of people. At least he didn't try to embrace him like Longbottom did. Hopefully next year's Head Boy would treat him like dirt. There weren't many candidates. Gryffindor had no sixth year male prefect with the removal of Lupin last year, and unless the new Gryffindor quidditch captain was male, that gave them only a pool of four. Wilkes from Slytherin was still treating him alright.

The school and its populace were in countdown mode to the holidays. Lily had offered some broad hints as to what they could do. Severus would be happy to spend some time with Lily, without Potter. He had everything ready. He did not plan meticulously because _felix felicitus _was supposed to guide him. Besides, if Lily had ideas of what she wanted to do, it would be harmonious for him to agree, if they weren't ridiculous.

When it was finally determined that Peter Pettigrew was missing, rather than out of bounds, Severus was questioned multiple times. It was rather insulting. If he wanted to do away with someone, it wouldn't have been Potter's pudgy pal, it would be James Potter himself. Severus had hardly seen Pettigrew outside of the classes they had in common since he got back from his suspension.

Slughorn must have gotten too many bottles as gifts because his suggested scenario was outlandish. Severus challenge Pettigrew to a duel after curfew, and Pettigrew showed up? How likely was that? Firstly, Potter would not let Pettigrew go alone. He'd probably have to drag him actually. Secondly, that night during detention Filch, Singleton and Pomfrey had seen him at different points in the evening. Of course, Severus had to be intentionally seen to cover his tracks. Right. Why not pull the cork out of another one? Duels were for show-offs. People like Dumbledore dueled so everyone could applaud and cheer. When Severus got into a fight, everyone would make fun of him with their jeers, clapping in rhythm and chanting 'Snape, Snape, Snivelly'. Followed by the crowd's disappointment when he overcame Black or Potter.

***********************************

Lily smirked as Severus was caught under mistletoe again. The school decorations were random with their trapping ability. Lily had only been stopped once so far this year, and had not been trapped in previous years. Severus had not been either, but seemed a favorite to come to an abrupt halt in hallways this year. He complained that it was not fair since some of the ceilings were too high to spot the snaring sprig, and he alternately called both Flitwick and Dumbledore foul names.

It only took a quick kiss on the cheek to free someone. Mary had beaten Lily twice to liberate Severus. Lily was not sure Severus even noticed since he grumbled sourly after each incarceration, no matter who gave him a peck.

This time, it was just Severus and Lily in the hall near the library so she grabbed his face in both hands and silenced him with a solid smacker. No tongues or snogging. That was rather crude when she saw someone doing that in the halls. Sev had a point. What were they thinking by putting up magical mistletoe? Prefects were allowed to take points for overly passionate displays, but Lily felt there would be less temptation without the parasitic, poisonous plant encouraging it.

Drat, Potter found them again. Lily smirked at his gobsmacked expression. What did he expect? Lily to leave Severus stuck under mistletoe for the rest of the day?

Why did Peter have to take the map with him? Foul play did cross James' mind, but Wormtail had an ace up his sleeve with his animagus form. He could escape from plenty of situations, and would probably write James over the holiday. He had known Peter had been very unhappy, but leaving school and without a word? Peter's only enemy was Snape, and Snape had to be a lot angrier at James than Peter, who was safely back in their tower before he disappeared, rather than presenting a tempting lone target to Snape.

James was floored when he rounded the corner searching for Evans and Snape. Evans was kissing Snape on the lips. James made a face trying to keep the bile from rising from his stomach and spewing out his mouth. It was that disgusting. From Snape's foul demeanor, James suspected it was him that had been caught by mistletoe. Good. He didn't enjoy it. Evans should have abandoned him there for everyone to laugh at as they passed.

Sirius and James had done extensive testing of the mistletoe in previous years. It didn't work if you had a class to attend. It would not hold someone who had not had their first kiss yet, and that did not include mothers. Thanks to Peter they knew that one. So someone had kissed Snape? Perhaps some strange Slytherin torture like do this horribly abominable thing, or you'll have to kiss Snape. The magic also would not keep someone unless there was a suitable partner in the vicinity to free them. That didn't necessarily mean someone would. Sirius would intentionally stand under mistletoe, including some that he carried around with him, acting like he had no choice, to lure girls in to kiss him. The joke was on him though, when he really was caught, and his mates had to draw straws to see who would have the dishonor of letting him get to dinner, when no ladies would believe he was actually trapped. It was so funny the way Remus closed his eyes before his face was even within a foot of Sirius' … those were good times. James missed that.

Feeling saddened to the point where he did not feel up to his original mission to prevent Snape from teaching Evans the Dark Arts, James returned to Gryffindor tower and went up to his room. Peter's things had been removed and sent to his parents, but the second bed was still there for his return. They'd know if Peter was alive or dead, right?

***********************************

At last, Severus and Lily were sitting quietly in the library as Hogwarts disgorged the students to go home on the train. There were others still in the building, but there was enough space for them to pretend it was just them. At least for now.

There were books between them, and they held hands over them, looking into the other's eyes. Severus felt he did not spend enough time looking at Lily's eyes. If they were together, married, he could wake up every morning seeing them, and go to sleep every night gazing into them. Although to some that might sound rather simple-minded, especially to Lily who claimed she was busy and had too much to accomplish before she'd have time for him, it should not be so hard to achieve. Why should he wait years for this? He was decided. Lily would not be forced to live the sequestered lifestyle that Mary MacDonald described once she fulfilled her life dream of being a bride. It sounded rather boring. He understood Lily had no intention of keeping house and bearing children, as soon as she graduated from Hogwarts. What was so difficult about Severus not having any firm plan, except that they'd be together? Everything else was rather unimportant.

Regretfully, Lily reminded him, "We have a lot of homework to get through. I think we should get cracking on it, and not put it off."

"Alright, Lily" Severus responded, still craving to stare at her, but not wanting a rift to form before the Hogwarts Express even pulled away from Hogsmeade Station. Lily could be a complete ass and waste their opportunity together by refusing to talk to him for days, or even the entire holiday.

They did accomplish much, with occasional glares from the librarian who had posted that he'd have the library open at this time, and a couple students searching for their own books to complete their homework. With both of them fetching and reshelving books, they moved around their table during the afternoon, so Severus did not initially think anything odd about Lily sitting next to him, and reading from the same book as him, until her naughty fingers started getting to work in his lap.

Overall, Severus was resigned to what Lily wanted and when, but he would like more say or even a hint into what she had in mind. He muttered, "The library is closing soon."

"I know."

"I acknowledge your intention, however I cannot respond well since I need to go to the desk to sign out books, and perhaps negotiate stairs to the dungeons or dinner."

"What do you mean, Sev?"

"I don't mind you touching me there, Lily, but if …" he sighed, than said, "If you get me hard, it's noticeable and difficult to walk like I normally do."

"Really?"

"If you want to test it out later, that's fine. I thought I should say something with time being so short."

"Um … alright," Lily responded. She kept her hand in his lap, but stopped fondling him through his trousers. "You do want to … uh, later?"

"Yes." He closed the book, and then added, "If you want to."

Lily frowned as they gathered up the books they wanted to take with them. Severus had ideas, really good ones in fact, when it came to doing things to her body. Things she had never even dreamed of feeling. At first, it sort of scared her. Especially with what Petunia said about her and Severus. How did Severus know what to do? Was it 'guy talk'? Helen and Mary had quite a bit to say about men's bodies. How did Petunia learn that sort of thing? Lily had heard her enough times on the phone to know she talked about boys, but not about their things. Just kissing stuff, mostly who was seen kissing who. What else did Severus know? Would he expect to do all that with Lily over the next couple weeks? Would they finally shag? Was she ready for that? Was Severus? At times, he was quite reluctant to go further. Although afterwards, Lily was glad he restrained himself. Sometimes her brain just turned itself off, and let her body do whatever it wanted. That was rather frightening.

Exiting the library with their books, Severus asked, "Did you want to have dinner in the kitchens, or eat in the Great Hall?"

"We get to eat together in the Hall?"

"We should. It depends on how many students and staff stayed."

"The Hall then so we can check it out. Can we bring the books, or do you need something from the dungeons?"

"Either way. I need to check my schedule with Mr. Filch, and can pass by his office."

"But it's the holidays."

"Sure is. I'm sure Mr. Filch will wish me a fine one and give me time off," Severus responded with a laugh.

"Why wouldn't he?"

Severus continued laughing. "I will suggest that, but since I was already starting at curfew time, it shouldn't interfere with our studies together."

Lily rolled her eyes at him. She wasn't worried about their studies. "You remind him about how hard you work, and that if you were home, he wouldn't have you to push around."

Descending the stairs, Severus spoke more loudly as they separated, "It's not so bad. He doesn't watch me the entire time. Filch knows I'll get the assignment completed."

"It's so stupid. Can't you just go to Madam Pomfrey while there's no one here and do what she wants?" she called down.

Lily thought she heard Severus respond "Hell no." Really, what was the big deal? Probably a hundred students saw him undressed in June.

She got to the Great Hall prior to Severus. Lily might be the only prefect left at the school. It was just a handful of young students. A little Slytherin girl showed up following Severus. She could give him scowling lessons. Since they were all here together, she might as well make the best of it.

Slughorn entered with a fatherly arm draped over Cresswell's shoulders. He was a Ravenclaw, a year or two under her and Severus. He announced, "Very good. You're all here. Cresswell here has volunteered to be in charge of you lot."

Lily huffed and crossed her arms over her chest. He wasn't even a prefect.

"You can all take meals in the kitchen, near the Hufflepuff common room. Just tickle the pear to get in. Do not take large quantities of food back to your rooms.

"Now for houses, let's see. Cresswell for the Ravenclaws, Chittock has the Hufflepuffs, you are alone for Gryffindor, Evans, and uh … Snape for Slytherin."

Lily snorted. That was mighty big of Slughorn considering there was only two Slytherins.

"You go to bed early or late?" Severus asked the girl.

"Why?"

"I merely wanted to suggest that if you don't get caught after curfew, I'll see you in the common room when I finish detention. Mine starts at curfew."

She folded her arms over her chest and muttered, "Alright."

"You still have detention?" Lily asked.

"That's what Filch thinks."

"Tell him different then."

"He does not work for me. It's the other way around, Lily."

"Well tell …" Lily paused, looking around. Slughorn would probably give Severus to Filch full-time, now that he had no classes to attend. "... how about uh, that um, Prof. Abacus?"

"Prof. Abstractus," Severus corrected. "He's gone home."

"Oh darn," Lily said. "What will you do when your in the mood for a rousing bout of Arithmancy, Sev?"

"I won't have time. Mr. Filch and I are starting a band. Mrs. Norris is our vocalist," Severus replied, sitting down to where the food had appeared for the students at the Hufflepuff table.

"And I left my bagpipes at home, drat," Lily replied. "I bet we'd be bigger than the Rolling Stones."

"If it wasn't for that darned secrecy law."

"Are there magical instruments?"

"Self-playing ones. The others are the same. Maybe a bit out of date to the muggle world like a lute."

"I don't really play the bagpipes, you know," Lily admitted.

"Thank goodness."

"Hey. There's some really good pipe and drum corps that play parades."

Severus looked thoughtful, then responded, "I don't think you've ever invited me to a parade."

"You don't need me to go to one," Lily replied. She may spend summer holidays with him, but they did not go to the center of town or public places together. Petunia would kill her. Why did she even care anymore? If she wanted to go see a movie with Sev, well, not if Petunia still worked there, but uh, to the ten-pin bowling alley with him, she would.

Flippantly, he asked, "How would I enjoy it without you?"

"Well, if it was a parade in honor of your chocolate frog card, I'm sure you'd make do."

"You wouldn't come?"

"Depends."

"If there was a pipe and drum corps?"

"Oh, definitely then."

Severus sat back, waiting for Lily to finish eating. Her constant consumption of meat and adding gravy to everything else was rather revolting. She'd want to kiss him after this, wouldn't she? He supposed it could be worse. Dumbledore and Slughorn were probably single because no woman wanted a sugar coated tongue in her mouth. They probably did obscene things with food, or ate in bed. Waking up with lemon hard candies stuck to your arse must really cool the ardour. More likely it was their self-centeredness that drove prospective suitors away over the years.

While mopping up more gravy with a piece of bread, Lily asked, "What's Cresswell doing at the head table?"

Severus shrugged, "Maybe Slughorn invited him."

"What a kiss arse."

"Eh, who cares? He'll be stuck up there listening to Slughorn ramble on about Senor Bunghole in Mexico and his amazing burro who carries crystallized pineapple into the Andes to the Peruvian quidditch team, that Slughorn knows each and every one intimately when they had a sugar orgy at the last World Cup."

"Sev! And Mexico is not close to the Andes."

"Maybe the burro's talent is it craps portkeys."

"Ugh!"

"He had some sculpture of uh … is a llama a real animal? At his holiday party."

"Who?"

"Slughorn."

"What? But … why … he forgot to invite me."

"Me too," Severus said with a grin.

"No, I mean it. He's invited me before."

"Did you miss not going?"

"He invites interesting people. You know, adult wizards and witches."

"What kind of job do you think he's going to obtain for Cresswell?"

"I don't know," she said, looking at the fawning Ravenclaw who was laughing at Slughorn's stupid tale. "Probably some Ministry flunky job. Look how he brown noses."

"Oh yeah," Severus said, then lowered his voice for Lily's ears alone. "That's a smashing robe you have on, headmaster. Is there room under there for me to hide out kissing your arse all day?"

Lily gasped, then gave his arm a smack. "You are too much sometimes."

"Come on. Look at how he dresses. He desperate for compliments."

"Do you think there's sequins on his drawers?"

Severus laughed. "Maybe a clever glow in the dark charm."

"With arrows," Lily said, repeatedly pointing towards her center and down.

"Is that my target this evening?"

"Sev, don't" said Lily, embarrassed and looking around.

"I think people believe we do homework."

"Or Dark Arts," Lily replied.

"Or something in the dark."

"I like seeing yours."

"If you must," Severus replied with a dismissive jerk of his chin.

"I like it. A lot."

"I wish you'd stop grabbing in Potions."

"We're in the back of the room."

"Working."

"I wait till you are in between steps."

He leaned back and asked, "Are you ready to leave, or did you want to wait to see what's for dessert?"

"Do you ever eat dessert?"

"Huh? Um, most of the time I don't, but I can wait."

"Maybe I can't. I want to get my hands on you."

"Alright, so up to Ravenclaw?"

"Out in the open?"

"Cresswell's probably going to be stuck here a while. The staff drinks during the holiday break so they stay at their table all evening."

"What?" Lily asked, and looked at the Head Table. They seemed behaved, but there was more cup raising than eating going on.

"Drink. Especially Hagrid."

Lily redirected her attention to the games keeper, and took note that he was gulping down a great quantity of liquid.

"I think when school's in session, he goes to the Hog's Head some evenings and then just heads back to his house."

She stood, saying, "Let's get going."

Severus followed, also glancing behind them as the staircases moved. Potter had gotten him in the habit of watching for others. There was so few left in the school, that anyone else on the stairs would be suspicious.

They went to the far window overlooking the castle at night.

Lily took a breath and said, "So you want to show me what happens if I um, get you too interested in the library?"

"If that's what you want to start with, Lily."

"Relax," she murmured, putting her lips against his neck. The shaving charm kept it smooth, no matter what time of day it was. Lily might like to try this when Severus had stubble, just to feel it once. She felt him swallow then take a deep breath through his nose. She went easy on him, and only put one hand in his lap, while she used to other one to trace his opposite cheek and jaw, continuing to mouth the side closest to her face.

Severus had closed his eyes. He couldn't help the shivers that shot into his shoulders. This was rather ...nice. Very nice. Lily's mouth and her fingers touching his face so gently. Her other hand was roughly kneading him. He hoped she got tired of treating his cock like her plaything sometime soon. Severus realized it was new to her since Lily did not have one of her own, but after she first touched it, she couldn't leave it alone. Lily was grabbing it every chance she got, when no one but him would see her. Perhaps after this demonstration, she'd settle for brushing it in public places rather than urging his body to demonstrate its interest, but having no outlet for it. The library? Potions class? At least she was scared enough of McGonagall to keep her hands on the desk in Transfiguration. They were also high in the back of Charms so Flitwick could look directly under their desks, so he was also safe there.

That got Severus to thinking. Lily had a bit of a risqué streak when it came to this. Would she want to do something in an unused classroom during the break? Although he wasn't much into fantasies, perhaps the appeal of her getting under the desk while he was forced to 'act normal' might appeal to her odd cravings. After her bending down to look at him in the toilet, Severus could not help but think of Lily's mouth. Some of Mulciber's materials on that subject were too rough on the witch, but if Lily wanted to experiment, Severus did not see the harm.

Lily put her second hand down to smooth the front of Severus' trousers. "More than this?" she asked.

"Huh?"

"It feels like its … um, you know."

"Oh, it can go a while longer," Severus muttered. She was so impatient. What did she want … a tea kettle? "Lily ..."

"Yes?" she eagerly responded.

"It takes my mind a while to sync up with the physical sensations. I don't excel at it like you."

Lily wondered if Severus was making fun of her, but he was still relaxing with his eyes closed, rather than looking like he was joking around.

Now that his concentration had been broken, he opened his eyes when she didn't respond. He looked down and then ran his hand along the front of his trousers. He asked, "How much were you hoping for? This is about five minutes worth of you manhandling me. More than potions, but we had longer than this left in the library."

"I don't know."

"Can't you see the difference?"

"Well, I guess. But wouldn't someone have to be looking at it?"

"It's rather hard to believe, but people do look at me, Lily."

"I didn't mean it like that. I mean look at the front of you."

"If I notice it on other blokes, than they can notice me."

"What other blokes?"

"Here at school."

"Really?"

Severus coughed, "I don't mean start staring at their crotches."

"I would only glance."

"Lily, who looks with her hands?"

"I wouldn't. Besides, I heard your _broom_ is larger than most."

Severus looked annoyed. "Is that your newfound interest in touching me?"

"No, I just meant that if yours is one of the better ones, why would I look at someone else's? Unless I merely wanted to confirm yours is best."

"You sound like a lecher."

"Severus!"

"Why would you say larger is better? From my experience, it's a larger target if someone kicks me."

"For the girl, silly."

Severus blinked, then smirked, "You do realize that shagging involves it entering the female body? Regardless of what you've heard, there is not a tunnel between your legs waiting for a train to drive through. It's rather small."

"Won't it … fit?"

"With your determination, Lily? I'm sure it will. Just in case, I already got two bottles of that mead you enjoyed."

"Why?"

"Relaxes your muscles."

"Oh, so you've already taken it for granted that this," Lily gripped his penis possessively, "is getting into me?"

"No, but I didn't want to have to sneak out to the Hog's Head when you decided that might make a difference."

"Alright, merely wanted to be clear that we have that understanding, Sev."

"Have I ever given you the idea that I'd do something like that without your express permission, Lily?"

"No, you don't. Even when you have my permission."

"I would not be keen on an audience."

"Neither would I. When Myrtle caught us that was rather shocking."

"From her tone or speaking voice, I think someone popping a zit in her mirror would be humiliating."

"Ewwe, Sev."

"What?"

"You're not spotty."

"So? Why would I want them? I think I receive enough compliments to turn my head without that."

"What do you do to keep them off your face? A potion? Charm?"

Severus arched an eyebrow at her. She would not take kindly to his suggestion that he did not bathe himself or his food in greasy gravy and guzzle it down by the bucketful. "Shall we add that to our research list, or has MacDonald already shared her secret with you?"

"Mary told you?"

"No, but since she's a witch who's overwhelmingly conscience about her appearance. I'm sure she has multiple ways to deal with any life-ruining blemish."

"Should I be concerned?"

"Right now? After dragonpox, some spot that'll be there a week is barely noticeable."

"No, about Mary?"

"What about her?"

"She fancies you."

"Still? I thought you two were joking around."

"I never said she was joking."

"Why didn't you tell her that we are closer than we act in public?"

"I um, told her I had feelings for you too."

"Feelings? Like in your hand that's gripping and feeling me? Or some vague sort of fancying that MacDonald thinks she has?"

Lily released her hold on him. Really, he could be so … idiotic. "I don't know. I didn't get explicit."

"You've already heard my advice on this, Lily. I have nothing further to say about it."

"But how could I tell her?"

"To avoid a possible dispute, perhaps? I have no interest in anyone but you, Lily."

Lily rolled her eyes, "I know. You always say that."

"There is no room in that for Mary, except as a friend. Strictly a friend," Severus explained, meaning that MacDonald was Lily's friend. Without Lily, he had no use for MacDonald.

"How do you know, Sev?"

"I feel no attraction towards Mary."

"No, I mean me."

"I am positive I feel about no one else the way I feel about you, Lily."

"How do you know? You don't try to talk to people."

"They lack your charm."

"Charm? What do you mean by that?"

"I don't find them interesting."

"You should try to give them a chance."

"How many chances should I give, Lily? Potter's following you around for weeks now. I don't know if I'd call my lack of outright hostility towards him a chance, but I am respecting your right to give him another one. I don't agree since he has not treated your repeated overtures with good intentions in the past."

"I wouldn't use Potter as an example. He's persistent in his … delusions."

"Persistent? Persistently on probation. No one can even be assured that if he does them major bodily harm that he'd even be reprimanded."

"You're right."

"So perhaps you see my concern that someone like that is shadowing you? He may not have done you any injury since the beginning of the month, but your 'use of the dark arts' will be just cause for him to 'defend himself'."

Lily recalled, "That's what they said about you. It was alright to attack you because you were a Death Eater."

"If You Know Who is recruiting first year students? Can't be bothered to train them up himself, and sends his minions to Dumbledore for schooling?"

"Well, you know how stupid they are."

"You were searching for my … I don't know, Death Eater membership card?"

"With the secret handbook, the Ministry could infiltrate his organization."

"More likely, you'd play spy."

"Maybe."

"You probably would to track down Sirius Black."

"Black?"

"A lot of his family supports him. Sirius may too. They certainly assisted him with avoiding any repercussions around here. Do you think they'd do that for someone who truly despised them?"

"Did you hear that from Regulus?"

"Regulus is not talking about his brother, except to express his loathing."

"When he's talking to you, I can imagine. What do you think happened to Pettigrew?"

"Oh, well, I'm not as clever as Slughorn on that matter. Can I say I don't know?"

"You have no theories?"

"Theories on Pettigrew? He's a liar, cowardly, hides behind others, only acts when he knows he won't be caught and will win. Perhaps he's haunting a primary school playground pushing little children off swings."

"I mean for real, Sev."

"How would I know? He didn't write me some mocking note giving away his plan. For all we know, he went back to find the most beautiful woman he ever saw, kicking himself for being a fool for never taking the time to introduce himself because he was afraid a muggle would laugh in his weaselly face."

"Huh?"

"Oh come on … last summer, he went to have a bit of fun, and saw this beautiful princess sitting in a muggle trophy case of some sort under all those bright lights. Pettigrew was distracted, nervous, and unsure with Black and Potter ready to laugh at any wrong move he made. Months later, he still woke thinking of her sheer beauty so decided to do something about it and set off to find your sister, Petunia."

"Petunia in a muggle trophy case?"

"That glass booth at the cinema. It's rather odd looking."

"No, it's not. Most of them look like that. Petunia wouldn't give someone like Pettigrew the time, if he asked."

"Ah, but he doesn't know that. He is only aware of her entrancing good looks, and the image he's built in his mind of approaching her, and sweeping her off her feet with his command of magic."

"Ha, Petunia, impressed by a wizard?"

"Yeah," Severus laughed. "She'll cut him down so quick, it'll be like a virtual dagger through his chest."

"Talk about heart break. But really, what do you think happened to him? This nonsense about him running away to join Black is unsupportable."

"Maybe Black invited him to cheer whenever he performed an act on his wife. Potter said he was in your tower after curfew. So he left sometime between curfew and breakfast. Either of his own free will, or was unwillingly taken by someone with access to your tower."

"Let's go with free will then."

"Since he didn't pack his things, Pettigrew did not run away. He was probably out of bounds somewhere in the castle, grounds, Forbidden Forest, Hogsmeade or wherever else the Marauders get to."

"That is a lot of ground."

"They think he only had two cloaks, and they were both here so in the castle is most likely. There's floo access too, besides the possibility someone mailed him a portkey."

"So even though Petunia's overwhelming siren like allure was still calling him after months, Pettigrew would not have set off without proper clothing. They did search the castle?"

"Yes, with Potter's help. Do you remember how he didn't follow us for two or three days?"

"Maybe he found a new secret room or passage and couldn't get out."

"Wouldn't the ghosts or house elves have heard him calling while they searched?"

"Perhaps, or perhaps it's so well hidden. Remember that story about Slytherin's secret chamber, Sev?"

"Oh yes, finally someone clever enough to find it arrived at Hogwarts, and it was Peter Pettigrew. All his research in the library finally paid off," Severus sarcastically intoned.

"I don't mean he found that room, but there's plenty in the castle that's been forgotten."

"Once we're done with homework and looking up your acne spells, we could work on that. I can try to ask Filch some questions. He is rather knowledgeable about the building, but his secret passages are probably a caretaker secret."

Lily rubbed her hands together in mock glee, "At last, you're finally getting into the spirit of things, Severus. Can't you smell it? That's called adventure."

"We can get together some supplies, in case we get lost. Maybe I can negotiate something with Filch to do twice as much the first half of the break, to have the second half off."

"Hey, that's a great idea."

"He hasn't agreed to it."

"But it's better than you being all gloomy."

"Gloomy? I'm not gloomy about detention. It's repetitive, but I've learned some things. I also know a little more about the castle which might aid us on this adventure of yours."

"It's our adventure."

"Hmm," Severus replied. Lily clearly forgot their last adventure with the werewolf. Gryffindors had some sort of memory lapse thing going on, besides being liars who rewrote history to make themselves look good. With him at least, they'd have light, water, food, rope, chalk, and the unimportant things that Lily would leave behind. "We should research charms that are appropriate for finding trails. Knowing merely direction won't aid us in some parts of the castle."

"Alright," Lily absently agreed, thinking ahead to how much fun this would be.

"Secret and hidden passage detection too, along with password breaking spells."

"Right."

"Since you are a prefect, we might be able to approach a friendly teacher like Flitwick with an outline of our plan, and develop some communication. Charm something to send an alert, in case one of us gets hurt."

"Or maybe a longer message. If we find something exciting, we won't have to worry about racing back for curfew."

Severus cocked an eyebrow at Lily. She was optimistically planning long-lost discoveries like Gryffindor's armory, and he was thinking of contingencies in case something befell them. Weren't they just talking about Pettigrew disappearing here in the castle? That was someone who did not take risks. Lily would probably want to cross some bottomless chasm on a threadbare rope bridge that was ancient when Merlin strolled about Cornwall.

Somewhere in all this, he wanted to have sex with Lily to loosely bind her to him in a noncriminal fashion that would not change her wills and desires. The connection would be very strong due to the change he made in the formula, but Lily could always leave him. She just would be very unhappy about it, especially since so much of her relationship with a male revolved around carnal desires.

Pretty much all his hopes of civilized interactions on that level with Lily were crushed. Severus did not envy his parents' ability to do it anywhere and anytime, or the various denizens and visitors of Spinner's End who did it out in the open. They were little better than animals. If it made Lily happy, he'd cooperate. If he was told years ago that all he needed to do was let her look at and feel his privates to mesmerize Lily into a drooling degenerate, he'd have said it was a lie. He was not reassured by her comparative assessment that his was bigger, therefore better.

Severus was not against the idea of making love to Lily. He would not be interested in marrying her otherwise. He'd rather it be more intellectual, if that was possible.

Suddenly becoming practical, Lily asked, "How much homework do you have for Arithmancy and Runes?"

"Enough," Severus admitted. "I can work on it tonight after detention, and also check on the double detention with Filch to see if he's amenable. With the library opening later, would it be alright if we meet at nine in front of the kitchens? I'll work till I'm tired, and then sleep later since no one's about."

"Except that girl."

"Right, I'll leave her a note in the common room. If I'm doing double detention, I don't want to keep her up waiting for me."

"That's nice of you."

"I guess. I wouldn't want someone keeping me waiting for hours, and then when I finally gave up, claim I was never there."

"Do you know why she's here?"

"For the holidays, I suppose? Greengrass got into some tiff with her friend and got uninvited at the last minute. That's why she's so surly looking."

"What kind of friend uninvites someone for the holidays?"

"Nasty Slytherin ones who wait till she burned all her bridges first, then make her look like a fool."

"You seem to know a lot about it."

"She followed me up to the Great Hall, yakking up a storm."

"Don't any of your friends invite you over for the holidays, Sev? Prior to this dragonpox year."

"Huh? I suppose if I expressed an interest to you, you'd invite me over, Lily, but that would have the same cost of a train ticket as going home."

"I mean your male friends from school."

"No. I don't … they wouldn't. I'm not the right sort to invite into their homes. They are here to make friends with children from other respectable, pureblood families, not me."

Lily frowned. She detected that Severus almost repeated his cliché that he had no friends, other than her. Besides Wilkes and Rosier, Regulus Black and Crouch ate with him. She could understand that Black couldn't invite Severus to his house. Well, maybe he would in some sort of sick Slytherin revenge thing and rub their bare bums on Sirius' pillow. Boys were so immature. Actually, Lily would like a few minutes unsupervised in his room to tear it up too.

"I'm here this year, Sev. You'll still have fun, even if I am cutting into your reading time."

He leaned his mouth to her ear and replied lowly, "Of course," and then nibbled on her ear lobe. He'd rather do lots of other things than talking about Potter, Pettigrew and Black.

When Severus started licking behind her ear, Lily got all tingly.

They got in a long, uninterrupted snog that had Lily cursing Severus' detention when he had to go.

***********************************

Since it was James' first day home, he woke early. He'd gradually stay up later and sleep later in the morning as the holiday wore on. Last night, he had posted a letter to Peter, but the owl came back an hour later, with it undelivered. It took two days to return when he tried it last week. Was Peter somewhere unplottable or hidden? If only owls could talk. Now that would be a highly useful animagus form.

James spent breakfast studying the sports pages thoroughly. They should dedicate more than two pages to quidditch. Most of the paper was full of crap.

His fork clattered to the plate as he dropped it …

***********************************

Lily had gone to the Great Hall in the morning for tea and to receive her morning edition of the paper. She was annoyed that she had not thought of that last night, when she agreed to meet Severus later. Other than the Great Hall, she did not know where else she could have it delivered. Lily could write to suspend delivery, but she felt as soon as she did that, something important would be in it.

Today there was. In the obituaries, Peter Pettigrew was dead due to 'previously sustained injuries'. What the hell did that mean? Where did he die and how?

Without thinking, Lily headed downstairs to the dungeons to talk to Severus. She could not wait over an hour till nine to see him in the kitchens. She stopped at the entrance to the Slytherin common room. Lily paced and made a face. With only Severus and one other student, Lily was not going to hold her breath. Severus also made it sound like Slughorn only visited his favorite students, so she did not count on him showing up.

Greengrass was the first to open the entrance. She was surprised to see Evans waiting outside their common room, but knew that Evans was close to Snape. They ate together last night after all.

"Could you please let Severus know I need to speak to him?"

"Like wake him up?"

"Yes, please."

"Hm, I can show you where," she replied. Snape was all bark with his insults, and had a reputation for returning jinxes and hexes. However, waking him up or pounding on the gents' door? This was only the first morning of the holiday, and Greengrass did not want to get on either Snape's bad side while she was trapped alone in Slytherin with him, or Evans, who was the only prefect left here.

"You mean inside?" Lily asked, her eyes lighting up at the idea of entering such forbidden territory.

"I'll make you a deal. You show me the Gryffindor common room, and I'll let you in here. I'll walk you to the right dormitory."

"Won't we get in trouble?"

Greengrass shrugged, "Who's going to tell on you? I'm not giving you the password, and I certainly don't know the password to any of the boys' rooms."

"The rooms have passwords too?"

"Yeah. If not, anyone could walk in."

"That makes sense. Alright, um, I guess with me being the only Gryffindor, we'll just need to know where Prof. McGonagall is."

"She eats dinner," was suggested.

"Uh, I'll have to work it out. I really want to speak to Severus now, either way."

"I could tell," Greengrass said, stepping backwards to allow Evans through the still open doorway.

"Thanks."

"It's not all lit right now, but the male side is this way."

"Is it always this cold?"

"The main fireplace warms it up when it's lit."

"I'm sorry. I'll try to remember my questions for Severus … after. My curiosity gets the better of me."

"That's fine. I'm sure I'll have a few questions about Gryffindor tower."

Greengrass led her into a hallway that descended deeper. The doors had bronze plaques with years and last names. "It's this one here. I don't know if he's in, or perhaps in the boys' bath."

Lily knocked and called, "Severus?" She made a face at the plaque. Did Severus somehow get his name on the bottom to prove something? Wilkes was at the top, marked as prefect, but then the three names in between were not in alphabetical order.

"Severus?" she repeated and knocked again.

"What?"

"It's Lily. There's something in The Prophet this morning about Pettigrew."

"What's the name of the street I live on?" was his reply.

"Huh?" Lily replied at the closed door.

"Either you know it or you don't."

"Spinner's End."

The door opened immediately. "You shouldn't be down here," Severus said as a greeting.

Lily looked at him. He was already dressed in his old clothes, and was holding his wand out.

Handing him the newspaper, Lily said, "Look, Sev."

Severus blinked, focusing his eyes on the obituaries. Sleepily he said, "Pettigrew's dead."

"Yes, but did you read it? Something about previous injuries?"

"Yes, I see that."

"Well?"

"How should I know?"

Greengrass interrupted, "It's a magic quill. The paper can't let it write actual details, or else people's families get upset. It has a limited list of causes of death."

"Previously is anything that could be from something he was born with, or he fell off a broom and it didn't immediately kill him," Severus speculated.

"Don't you find it strange? He disappeared from school."

"I'm not disagreeing, Lily. I'm simply tired."

"The Ministry might not even have a body," Greengrass said, warming to the subject. "The quill writes obituaries all the time, before the family even knows."

"That's horrible," Lily said. "It doesn't say where."

"It'll say if he died at home only. There's a lot of impropriety that could be exposed if addresses were supplied." Greengrass explained.

"Impropriety?" Lily repeated.

"You know, like something embarrassing."

Severus stifled another yawn. The girls could talk this all over without him. He was interested in how Pettigrew met his end, but unless he or Lily were in immediate danger, he felt it could wait till later today. He had told Lily he would be up late doing homework. He had worked on Runes till he could no longer see them, which was less than two hours ago. He interjected into their musing of the working of a magical quill, "If you give me a few minutes to get cleaned up, I'll come with you to the kitchens."

"Aren't you ready?" Lily asked.

"No," Severus replied, wondering if Lily thought there really was no difference between his appearance when he just woke, and after he brushed his hair and made some effort to straighten himself out. Though he would not put it past her to think that he had been sitting here like a lifeless lump, ready and waiting for her to come pounding on his door. The first morning of her first holiday stay at Hogwarts was never too early for a Gryffindor to bully a first year into admittance into their house's living quarters. Lily would probably be twisting Cresswell's arm later today to see Ravenclaw. Severus had seen the envious way she was looking at him last night. He'd better watch his step.

Lily fluttered her hands at him, and urged, "Well, hurry up."

When Severus turned to go to his trunk, Lily and the girl followed him in. His mouth twisted. Insulting the first year for following Lily's lead would only make her angry at him for picking on her new ally. He couldn't blame the twerp since this might be the most exciting thing to happen till the other Slytherins returned.

"What's all this?" Lily asked while he was fetching his items.

"Huh?" he said, looking up to see her sneering at the desk he was using. "It's my Runes homework. I have to look it over, and recopy some of it. Then it'll be finished. Please don't rearrange it."

"I wasn't."

Severus lifted an eyebrow at her before leaving to head deeper down the passageway. Greengrass would restrain herself from Slytherin mischief for two reasons. Foremost is he had plenty of time to redo any homework she destroyed and take his revenge. Secondly, what reason did she have for bothering him? He and Evans might be the only two people that would talk to her for weeks. Since Evans had now recruited her as part of her team to solve the mystery, she'd see their intentions were not to torment those weaker than them. Maybe if he got a chance, Severus would ask her if she wanted Evans to leave her alone, when Lily was not around. Greengrass probably was given no choice in the matter.

Lily frowned at Sev's trunk. He had locked it before he left, and her unlocking spell did not open it. For her companion's benefit she explained, "I wanted to see what he got me for Christmas."

"Oh," was the reply, as Greengrass kept her face neutral as she looked at what had to be the grubbiest trunk in Slytherin. Someone else would use it to hide valuable things, but even a first year knew by December that Severus Snape had no valuables. She had to smirk at Evans' noise of disgust before she cleaned off the 'blood traitor' graffiti. Even a thick Gryffindor like Evans had to know what it meant, and that she was the cause of it.

"You can call me Lily, if you like."

"Um, Pandora," Greengrass replied, starting to inspect what the other four, and more interesting, occupants left in the room. Her gasp at the quidditch poster tacked to the inside of one of the posher four poster beds brought Evans over to look.

Lily was agog at the lewd display that would probably have been right at home in the Gryffindor boys' rooms. She was aware that the Holyhead Harpies was an all female team, but … uh, this couldn't be the real team, or so she hoped with the thought that there had to be the slightest smidgen of professionalism even in quidditch. Seven grinning, nude, young, buxom women were leaning forward on brooms while a cheeky wizard was behind each of them mounting both the broom and the ladies. Being a wizarding poster, there was movement and it was seamless where it began and ended so it was seven nonstop shags doggy-style. It was absolutely disgusting.

Greengrass grabbed her arm when Lily went to rip it down. "We're not supposed to be in here."

"That item is against the rules."

"So? You aren't here to see it. Understand?"

"But ..." Lily stopped. Pandora was correct. Lily went over to Sev's bed, but other than being unmade, there were nothing personal in it. Even when she leaned in and looked up at the canopy.

Only one other had no pin-ups. One had a single large photo of a nude woman and … Lily hoped she did not make a face like that. The last had its curtains closed for a very good reason. It was … Lily had heard of places that foul sorts of men went to see movies or buy more than the mainstream type of magazines, but obviously one of Sev's roommates knew where the wizarding equivalent was.

She pulled Greengrass away, "That's something neither of us should be looking at." She was a prefect and had to set a good example. Lily closed up the curtains, rearranging the folds in what she hoped looked like it was untouched.

Some of the images had burned themselves onto Lily's retinas, and she stood quietly in stunned silence reviewing them in her head. Some of that could not be physically possible, even with magic. Much of it looked akin to torture. Different from the kind of torture that Severus sometimes got up to with her. When Lily said stop and no, it was the kind she didn't mean. Severus knew. How he knew, well, she had no idea. But if any of that was going on, Lily would definitely mean stop. She wouldn't even want to start.

Severus returned to the two silent girls and glanced at them before putting his things away. He could tell they were up to something, but his Runes homework had not been set on fire. That was something good. He also saw he still had a pillow, blanket, mattress and hangings.

"All of you have different beds?" Lily asked.

"Not really. They brought stuff from home."

"Who's is which?"

"Does it matter? Or are you performing some sort of reconnaissance for a Gryffindor invasion?" Severus finished warding his trunk, and asked, "Are you ready to go to the kitchens?"

Greengrass headed out the door. She suspected that bed in the back corner was Mulciber's.

Lily came along too, and asked, "Sev, any more thoughts on Pettigrew?"

He frowned at her and replied, "No." Whoever got Pettigrew out of the school didn't leave their plan lying on the floor of the Slytherin male bath. Lily would not be satisfied even if she was a fly on the wall of the Ministry listening in on what MLE was doing for Pettigrew's parents.

***********************************

When the rumor started that Peter Pettigrew had disappeared, and probably ran away to join Sirius Black in Europe, Avery and Mulciber cast their eyes towards Snape. Pettigrew said that's who he'd target. They'd try to recruit the brilliant Slytherin, but Snape was so irredeemably tainted. Although in the most liberal of minds, one could not help who their parents were, the half-blood preferred the company of that filthy mudblood rather than proper wizards and witches.

Now he was confirmed as dead after days of being held somewhere by Snape. Perhaps they better avoid any entanglements with the sadistic half-blood.

Pettigrew had been a long shot anyway. He would have been just one of the multitude serving the Dark Lord, not someone who would be favored. They perceived him as good with the kneeling, bowing, scraping and general fawning over those greater than him. Obviously they were right. That was all he was cut out to do. They could only hope the stupid Gryffindor did not tell Snape everything before he was eliminated.

***********************************

Between the horrible day when Pettigrew's death was in the newspaper and Christmas, Lily spent her waking hours being intensely dissatisfied. There was more about Pettigrew in the paper, but it said nothing. Nothing at all. Pandora Greengrass had guessed right that there was no body found. It could even be still in Hogwart's, for all they knew. Severus didn't think so because of the house elves and ghosts being able to cover the entire school, even sealed rooms. If Pettigrew had been trapped or injured, he wouldn't have been stoically resigned to his fate, he'd be crying his eyes out and making quite a bit of noise. Severus also looked up the ability to survive without water for a week. Lily was disgusted by his discovery of a scientific looking table with temperatures and amounts of water based on wizarding experimentation on muggles. The simple answer was that with normal indoor temperatures, Pettigrew must have found something to drink.

All three of them completed their homework and a book of beauty and grooming tips for teen witches was found. Lily could now stay clean-shaven, fresh-smelling, pimple-free, go curly or straight haired, and apply some modest charms to her emphasize her attributes.

Lily did admit Pandora to her common room, and showed her the girls bath and her own bedroom that she shared with Mary. Lily wanted to pay her back because she wanted to ask a favor to be let into Slytherin on Christmas morning.

Greengrass was interested in their possible exploration of the castle's less used areas, and together they were working on a list of useful spells and items they should carry along. The Slytherins also found writing charms to sign them in and out of their common room for the other to know, rather than either of them needing to wait to see the other.

Mr. Filch had cooperated with Severus and told him what he expected to be completed over the holiday. Severus had written it up as a list and was working his way through it with an update to Filch whenever he completed something in its entirety for him to check it. Severus felt that it was technically more than he would have been able to do in a couple hours each night, but he would not be in detention at all if things were fair. Lily volunteered to assist with Myrtle's bathroom, worked on the lights and kept shifting the color of the fixtures and tile for the ghost's approval. Severus had researched more on plumbing and drainage. The overflowing water would be detrimental to whatever he spruced up so he added grooves into the floor to siphon the water into a drain he installed into the main pipes. This should also prevent water from getting into the hallway, unless Myrtle went completely crazy and was able to break the pipes open rather than having it fountain out when she was in a terrible snit.

Lily was still kissing Severus under the mistletoe, and they were snogging at least daily when Greengrass was not around. They did not discuss Mary, however Lily and her did write each other. Lily had a niggling thought that she should say something nice or complimentary to Severus about how absolutely brilliant he could make her feel. She worried that he may think she took it for granted, especially since Lily had not discovered if he even enjoyed this sort of thing. He would voluntarily kiss her and maybe one time out ten start the snog session, so he wasn't entirely against it.

She was surprised after dinner on Christmas Eve when Severus asked if she'd like to play with him in a classroom. When she asked, he explained, "You were doing it when we could get caught, but now you could go a lot further. If you'd like, I could pretend there's a teacher present and _resist_ everything you do to me while squirming in agony because I want you so badly, but I can't."

Lily smirked, she liked the sound of this squirming in agony bit. "Have you picked a classroom already?"

"Yes, none that we use, but with the bigger table-like desk so you can hide properly."

"Oooh … have you been thinking of this long, Sev?"

"Me? You're the one molesting me in class. I don't grab your hand and make you do anything."

"Your eyes tell me to misbehave."

"Oh really? It's in here. The door's normally locked so if this room's alright for you, I'll lock us in."

Lily thought the desks looked the ones in Prof. McGonagall's classroom. "So uh … you'll sit down, and I sit next to you?"

"Or under the desk. I can cast a cushioning charm for you."

Her eyes lit up with understanding. It was so naughty. "I'll cast it. Are you going to sit in the back?"

"I don't know. Maybe I'm such a bad student, I have to sit up front."

"Well, pick a desk," Lily said impatiently, warming up to this idea very quickly.

"This one alright?" Severus asked at one in the middle of the room.

"Oh yes, Sev. Everyone will be watching you squirm here," Lily purred and got under it.

Severus sat down, but unlike his normal way of being seated, he bent his knees and let his feet rest on their toes on either side of the chair to give Lily all the room she needed. He asked, "Did you want me to ..."

"No, you're perfect. Pay attention to class, or you'll lose Slytherin points."

Severus smirked and folded his hands on his desktop. Lily obviously did not want any help.

She teased him a bit before unbuttoning and unzipping him. Her slow torture continued until she felt ready to move onto the next part and pulled him out into the dim classroom. It was dark under the desk, but Lily knew exactly what she was doing as she listened to Sev emit involuntary noises. They were slight, along with the little hitches in his breathing, but not loud enough yet to get this naughty student into trouble.

Lily had been considering something she had seen that morning in Sev's room in that display of utter filth. It sort of made sense, since Severus did not seem to mind putting her mouth on her. When she kissed it, Severus moaned. Not loud, but it did get Lily's attention.

While she was still experimenting with how this was supposed to work, Severus stopped pretending for a moment and put his hand under the desk to touch her face. His fingers drifted about for a few moments before they stopped on her lips.

Lily asked, "Is this alright?"

"I guess. I'll uh … say something so you move back."

"Why?"

"You may not like how it tastes."

"Is it that bad?"

"How would I know?"

"Maybe I want you to surprise me this time. Give it a try."

"Are you crazy?"

"I'm a Gryffindor, Sev. Now shut up and pay attention."

He removed his hand and put it back on the desk. As Lily resumed, he tensed and let his fingers flutter at each other before tightening them into fists. If Lily didn't like this, he'd find a spell to make it taste like gravy. This was incredibly wonderful.

It ended way too soon for Severus. Lily would not say one way or the other whether it had been terrible. She felt she needed to think about it. Severus really liked this, but although it wasn't so bad, it wasn't great for her … until Severus asked, "Did you remember to put knickers on this morning, Miss Evans?"

"Huh?"

"Let's switch. Now it's your turn, and I'm going to find out real soon if you were too absent minded to put on a pair this morning."

Lily quickly pulled them off and threw them on the floor, muttering as she got in the chair, "Oh gosh, how could I have forgotten to put on knickers today? I hope no one notices." Unlike Severus, she put her knees together as she sat.

Her teasing was nothing compared to Sev's. By the time he even got up there, he had kissed every one of her bared toes, and everything else he could get to under the desk. Lily was ready to scream, when she wasn't teasing him with comments such as, "Oh dear, I'm feeling so hot. I'm so lucky I forgot to wear knickers today so I can try to cool down."

***********************************

Kreacher was apoplectic on Christmas morning. Some foul wizard had dishonored the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black's beautiful, antique dining table by planting an obscenely large meat cleaver in the center of it, and poor, unworthy house elf that he was, Kreacher could not remove it.

Over his wife's cursing and her house elf's wails while it beat itself in the head with a sterling pepper mill, Orion pondered the meaning of this intrusion. Twelve Grimmauld Place should be impenetrable. A bunch of quidditch players should not have breached its defenses. Other than the Parkin family, to whom the cleaver was a too obvious indicator, his family had many other enemies. Which of them was idiotic enough to think he'd fall for it being those Parkin simpletons?

***********************************

Although she was sixteen, Lily woke early on Christmas morning. There was really no need for it since her presents would be waiting for her no matter what time she rose. She had not been spending time in Gryffindor tower since it was creepy when it was empty. She knew house elves visited it, and she had seen Headless Nick float through a couple times, but the lack of noise was unreal. Even in the middle of the night, someone would be carrying on.

She received lovely clothes from her parents, and a nice cardigan from Petunia. It was addressed in her sister's writing, so perhaps she had come to her senses.

Severus' gift was flat. Too flat for a book. Hmm, what could he have done this year? The sides of it were raised and bumpy. Guessing never worked on his, she conceded as she ripped the parchment open. It was … a framed chocolate frog card? Her card. It was encased between two panes of glass in a chocolate brown frame with a frog on each corner. Her picture was a bit fierce looking with her red hair flying about enough to form the background. She was portrayed with normal flesh tones. How he'd do this? Lily turned it over to read the back, that must be why he used two panes of glass.

'At the mere age of seventeen, Lily Evans knocked the wizarding world arse over tea kettle with a ballpoint pen.'

She blinked at her blurb, thinking. Yes, she liked it. Sometime in the next year would not be too soon to make her mark. Sort of like announcing her arrival, and that these idiots better take notice of her.

There was a brief note from Severus explaining that the glass was magically inert to protect the card from stray magic. Her mouth twisted. How could she spend so much time with Severus, and still have no clue what he was up to, or even what he was capable of doing? This looked like a real chocolate card frog, if she remembered Famous Witch and Wizard cards correctly. She looked at them back when she started school, but chocolate frogs were not as good tasting as Honeydukes Best. Lily suspected it was the croakoa.

Mary sent her some Honeydukes Best. Was she that easy to shop for?

Lily chose some of her new clothes to wear. She had plenty of time before Greengrass was going to open the dungeon door to let her in to surprise Severus.

***********************************

Severus did intend to catch up on his sleep soon. Filch's list had one item left and his homework was completed. In the worst case, he could sleep when Lily did. She needed more hours of sleep than he did every night.

He was sleeping right now, or ten seconds ago when someone interrupted the absolute quiet of the dungeon by pounding on his door.

Severus lit the room and cast a time charm. Five after seven in the morning. Severus did not need a window in the door because he heard Lily calling, "Sev, open up. Happy Christmas!"

Drawing a deep breath, he rolled out of bed. It was going to be the 25th all day. He quirked an eyebrow at the large wrapped object in front of his bunk. Lily better not have gotten him something really stupid. Whatever it was, it was inconveniently big. It was as bulky as his school trunk.

He opened the door for Lily. She grabbed him and gave him a quick kiss, "Happy Christmas." Lily pushed past him into his room. "You haven't opened anything yet, Sev." She noticed he had a gift from someone other than her.

"I was sleeping, Lily."

"But you're dressed."

"Yes, did you expect me to sleep with nothing on?"

"No, don't be silly."

"Maybe not, if you're banging on my door this early, trying to catch me."

"Sev, I came to be with you on Christmas morning … not to, well, maybe later."

"What's that Christmas phrase about being naughty?"

"Oh yes, Santa's list of children, he watches to see who's naughty or nice. You've been very nice, Sev."

"I have?"

"Definitely. You are so nice, but you make me feel naughty. It's brilliant."

Severus looked Lily over. She was dressed conservatively, if she meant to shag today. He could take the _felix felicitus _from his trunk with him to the loo to drink it, when he got his other items out. Though if he knew Lily, she wouldn't want to here. Too simple, and she liked odd places. It was convenient to have a bed. He'd like that because Lily would probably want to be on top.

When Severus did not respond with some playful comeback, Lily decided he must not be a morning person, or at least in the winter. He was an early riser in the summer. "Um, I guess you are kind of tired?" she asked.

"Yeah. I should finish up on Filch's list today though so you and I can plumb the depths of the castle."

"Excellent. Prof. Flitwick is interested in hearing of our plans. I don't know if I'll get him to waive curfew for us. What do you think of Pandora joining us?"

"Uh, that might make it sound educational to Flitwick to bring Greengrass along," Severus reluctantly agreed. With Lily in adventure mode, she'd be too busy running into things first to worry about making out. Perhaps worry over a first year's safety would slow her down.

"Great idea, Sev."

"Can I go to the gents, or did you want me to open your present first?"

"Open my present. That's why I'm here," Lily answered, picking up her package from the floor next to whatever the big thing was.

"Oh, than what's … that?"

"I don't know. We'll open that one next."

Severus opened the wrapped box that Lily had handed him. "This is useful. Thank you."

Lily was studying Sev's face when a smirk broke out. "What?" she asked.

"You shopped for this?"

"Yes, I did. Surprised?"

"Why would I be surprised? You probably demanded to try them on."

"Let's both try them on," Lily said with a huge smile.

"Now?"

"Open this first. I want to know what it is."

"Alright," he answered, stepping over to it to find the tag. "It's from MacDonald."

Lily frowned. Was Mary trying to influence Severus with some fantastic gift? She ran her hands over the wrapping paper, even though it was not her gift. There was vertical ridges. About a third of the way down, and a third again, there was a horizontal one.

Severus allowed Lily to investigate. She had told him long ago about this tradition to guess what a gift was. He'd know what it was soon enough. MacDonald seemed to listen to things he said so it might be something of interest. However, knowing her, it was probably impractical. A life debt did not compel someone to think.

When Lily looked at him, standing back to give her room, she realized that Severus was waiting for her. "Oh, sorry, I don't know. Some kind of cage?"

Cage? What would MacDonald have in cage? Pettigrew? Or more correctly, dead Pettigrew? Although MacDonald had the right attitude when it came to the Marauders, Severus would not enjoy receiving the body of any of them as a gift. That was no gift, he'd have the burden of disposing of them.

"Hurry up and open it," Lily urged.

He gave her an annoyed look. Now that Lily was done with her guessing game, he was to immediately open his gift. Severus was still thinking about the cage. Obviously, he could not guess aloud it was a caged body. Nothing else was coming to mind, so he tore the paper.

Lily's eyes narrowed. Mary MacDonald was such a dirty sneak. It was so beautiful. And Lily had been there when Mary asked Severus questions in Hogsmeade.

Well, it wasn't a dead body at all. It was alive. This was marginally better. Though solving the mystery of Pettigrew's death would probably please Lily. She was obsessed. However, something alive would need care for years. A lot longer than hiding a body. He asked, "What the hell am I supposed to do with this?"

Shocked by Severus' question, Lily felt her spirits buoyed. It was hard to imagine Severus being displeased with the gift of a striking familiar such as this, but she tried to see it from his point of view. The cage was large. He could shrink it when it was empty. This would need to be fed. At Hogwarts, there was food, but Lily was not sure how much Sev had to eat on his own. Could this hunt for itself like in the wild? Lily prodded Severus by suggesting, "It's very nice looking."

"I don't need something nice looking. Someone will kill it."

It was not very nice to attack other students' familiars, but not unheard of. Yeah, someone would want to kill Severus' familiar, even if it was not a large, glossy, black bird with gleaming eyes. "Maybe it's smart enough to protect itself."

"Trapped in a cage in the dungeons?"

"Can't it live in the owlery?"

"I don't think it's an owl, Lily."

"I know it's not, but there it could get some sunshine and fresh air and fly around."

"I guess we could try."

"Take it out."

"Me?"

"It is yours."

Severus opened the large door to the cage, but had his wand out. So far it had remained quiet and still, but its glittering eyes had him thinking that it was more intelligent than an owl. Owls could bite wizards, and this thing had wicked looking claws. "You can exit the cage," he told it.

"You are supposed to reach in for it, Sev."

"If it's smart, it should know what I mean. Besides, those wings are so big they cover its whole side, what if I hurt them while trying to pick it up?"

Lily tutted and nudged Severus aside, she'd get it out. When she reached in, the bird caw'd really loudly and hopped along its perch. It partially unfurled its wings, then folded them again. If Lily were to attribute above average intelligence to this familiar, this thing knew it was a gift from another girl to Severus and was going to do all it could to make her look like a fool in front of Sev. The joke was on this featherduster though, Lily had looked like a fool many times in front of Severus.

Severus grumbled, "I don't think this cage is large enough for it. Shouldn't it be able to fully open its wings?"

Standing back up, refusing to be made a joke of on Christmas morning, Lily asked, "I didn't notice, how much more room do you think it would need?"

"Uh, at least a foot. Is this thing normal sized?"

"I don't know. Is it a crow or raven?"

"How should I know?"

"Both are supposed to be smart."

"When it starts doing sums, I'll believe it."

Lily laughed. "Maybe we should take it to the kitchen to eat, and the house elves might recognize what it is."

"Library's closed today too."

"Have you seen Prof. Kettleburn?"

"I don't think so. I've been avoiding everyone but Filch."

"I've only been talking to Prof. Flitwick myself, but there's a feast tonight."

"Are we invited?"

"Prof. Flitwick let me know and gave me the time. It's at six."

"Did you want to go?"

"Yes. Don't you?"

"Alright, we might as well tell Greengrass too, since she usually eats with us."

"Reach in and get it," Lily said, returning to their avian companion.

"Why should I? If it wants to eat, it'll get out here, or we'll have a house elf come here to feed it. Besides, I should get cleaned up before breakfast anyway."

Lily crossed her arms impatiently as Sev got his things out of his trunk.

On his way out of the room, Severus gave the foul bird a dark glare. If it wasn't for its unwelcome appearance, today would have been perfect to make love to Lily for the first time. However now she was fascinated with this smelly bag of feathers. He remembered when she first got that owl. It wasn't anything special, but Lily acted like it was the greatest, smartest and most beautiful thing ever. Now she only used it for sending mail.

While in the loo, Severus considered getting rid of it. Well, he had had that in mind since he first saw it. It was a gift from MacDonald. He did not care what MacDonald thought, but Lily cared about her, and if she told Lily to ignore Severus because he was worthless, as her and Parkin did for the first five years of school, Lily would. She had before. He'd have to wait till this bird ticked Lily off. So far, it was off to a good start since it did not immediately jump onto her outstretched arm and start singing her favorite songs.

Lily took the opportunity to view the lewd pictures that had been haunting her thoughts for days, while Severus was out of the room. This was really sick stuff. She should be feeling disgusted, but it also made her rather randy. Not that she'd do any of this stuff, well, except she did not find putting her mouth on Sev's thing so bad, and sometime soon they'd be putting it there … ugh, did ...wait, was that … ewwee … that was so wrong. Swallowing hard and screwing up her face in disgust, Lily put the bed curtains to rights.

Oh crap, the bird was gone. The door to the room was closed so it's here somewhere. It wasn't at the bottom of its cage, that was definitely vacant. It wasn't flying about in here. Closest was Sev's things, but it wasn't on his trunk or perched on top of or in his bed. Would it like it up high to look at everything? There it was. It was on the bed next to the pervert's, perched on the edge of the canopy. Was it watching her? What if it had some really good power that Lily heard that some familiars had? It might be able to tell Severus that Lily enjoyed looking at dirty photos. And not normal dirty photos either.

It was looking at her. It knew. Damn. Lily had to do something before Sev got back. She went over to the cage and closed the door. Ha, it wouldn't be able to get back in there to take the blame for … uh, something. What? Lily looked around and decided the rip the nasty quidditch poster. That would be no loss. Hm, was that enough? Lily pulled at the forbidden bed's curtains and one of them tore loose.

Severus returned to his room. Lily was sitting on his trunk with her wand out. She announced, "The bird flew out and messed some stuff up."

He set it right with two _reparo_s. Could have been much worse. "Oh, you closed to cage. Good. It might be easier for it to follow along if it can't retreat to there. Let me straighten up my things and then we'll go. Could you get off my trunk?"

"Oh, yeah," Lily replied, keeping an eye on the bird that had barely stretched its wings to hop over to the top of Severus' bed.

While Lily was distracted, Severus pocketed the potions and shrunken mead while sorting through his stuff. Perhaps something unfortunate would happen to the bird, and Lily would comfort him on its loss.

Too late, Lily realized that Severus had stowed away all his new underwear. She guessed now was not the time to insist he try it on and model it for her. Stupid bird. And stupid Mary MacDonald. Ruining her Christmas.

Lily felt Severus was wasting his time by talking directly with the thing. "If you want a choice of food, you can come with us to the kitchens." It merely cocked its head to the side.

"Do you want to try to grab it?" Lily asked.

"No. Let's go."

"What if it makes a mess in here?"

"I'll fix it. My homework's away so it can't damage anything important," Severus replied. He opened the cage door, in case it wanted to go back in there. Maybe that's why it damaged things earlier. Lily was trying to force it to come to her by following it around, and locked it out of its cage.

As they left, the bird swooped at Severus' back and gripped a solid perch on his left shoulder. He muttered, "What the fuck? Get off."

It responded by leaning towards his face and looking him in the eye. Severus turned his face away from it.

"Isn't that what it's supposed to do?"

"I've seen owl ride on wrists and forearms, but I don't want this right next to my head."

"Does it hurt?"

"I'm not bleeding."

"Maybe you can get it to move onto me?"

"Your jumper's a lot nicer."

"Oh, you like it? It's a gift from Petunia."

Severus made a face. For all Lily's carrying on that Petunia hated her, Petunia was somewhat like Lily. Not like Lily, but she had similar tendencies. Lily would not stay mad at Petunia long, and it was doubtful Petunia would inwardly dislike Lily. Outwardly, Lily would get called freak. Not as much as Severus obviously, but Petunia didn't mean it with the same cruelty towards her sister.

Greengrass was waiting for them in the common room. "I didn't know if I should wait, I was just about to leave without you two."

"Sorry," Lily replied. "This was giving us a bit of a problem."

"That a raven?"

"I guess," Severus said, unable to shrug due to it holding onto one of his shoulders.

"My great uncle had one. He was kind of like Filch, just him and the bird."

That didn't sound reassuring to Severus. Maybe MacDonald wanted Lily back, and thought that if she bought him a new best friend, that he'd spend more time with the bird than Lily. Now that was Gryffindor logic at its best.

"We're taking it to the kitchen so it can take its pick of food," Lily commented.

"Have you named it?" Pandora asked.

"Not yet," Lily said, interrupting whatever Severus was going to say. She didn't want him naming it something idiotic. Given time, she could think of plenty of great names for this bird.

"It has not been determined whether it's male or female," Severus informed them. He'd rather wait till he knew its bad habits. If it rode on his shoulder long enough, he'd definitely know if it was housebroken. That would be really lovely, and he'd probably take to calling it shithead.

"Oooh, I know the charm for that from Magical Creatures," Lily exclaimed.

She took out her wand, and with a flourish and brief incantation, declared, "It's a girl."

"Do you have any books on familiars or magical birds?" Severus asked.

"No, I don't. I agree its rather inconvenient to have the library closed today. Do you think a professor would let us in, if we asked? Obviously we have a reason to want to do research today."

"I doubt we'll kill it between today and tomorrow," Severus answered.

"Not it, her," Lily corrected.

It was still an it to Severus. He could call Mrs. Norris female. Her name had seemed silly when Filch first got the half-grown kitten, but she had grown into it. He doubted this bird had even a tenth of the talent that cat did. He wasn't sure what Mrs. Norris' powers actually were, but if no student had killed her yet, she must be pretty powerful. "Can you tell how old it is?" Severus asked.

"That's one I'm going to have to look up. By the way, Pandora, there's a feast tonight in the Great Hall at six. Prof. Flitwick invited us, in case Slughorn gives us any trouble."

"Is Slughorn even here? He was talking about all his invitations, so he might be away," the first year informed them. If someone told her earlier that she'd be spending her holiday with Severus Snape and his mudblood, Pandora would have thrown herself off the clock tower. She could have gone home, but her parents had already been told that she was staying with the Warringtons. Her parents would have been highly disappointed with her if she had intruded upon them. When Warrington returned, Pandora had ensured she would not get a single night's unbroken rest in that bed ever again. No one trifles with a Greengrass.

"Than there might be some dessert left for us, outside of Dumbledore's reach," Lily suggested brightly.

Severus wondered if there would be any gravy custards for Lily, or if she would just hold over a full gravy boat from an earlier course to drown her pudding.

"Dahlia?" asked Lily.

When no one answered her, Lily repeated, "What do you think of Dahlia, Sev?"

"What?"

"For your bird. Or how about Peony?"

"Aren't those flowers?"

"Yes."

"She doesn't look like a flower."

"I'm not a flower."

"Your name is to indicate your parents' wish for you to be graced with beauty."

"It's nicer than Pandora," Greengrass added.

"Why?" Severus asked. "Wasn't she the first woman? The all-endowed?"

"Do you have anything nice to say about your name, Sev?"

"I am not a girl. I think he was a Roman General and Governor of Britain. That was even before Merlin."

"I thought he was an emperor," Lily said.

"Maybe it was a common Latin name that fell out of favor. Coronis is from the Greek legend about why crows and ravens are black. They were white before Apollo cursed them."

"Coronis?" Lily repeated in distaste. Dahlia was much better.

"She doesn't need to be named today," Severus said, sensing Lily's tone of voice. If they had two daughters, they'd end up named Dahlia and Peony because Lily would hold a grudge that long, if he argued over the stupid bird's name. It wasn't important, but Lily should realize it had to be something he wouldn't mind using to refer to it.

"There are ravens in Norse mythology too," proposed Greengrass.

"Was it Huginn as thought, and Muninn as memory? Odin let them loose each morning to fly over the world to bring him news."

"Those aren't very nice names," Lily interjected.

"Something Norse then? Valkyrie are female."

"Eh," was Lily's response to Severus' suggestion.

Pandora was getting tired of this. If it was Snape's bird, he could name it whatever he wanted.

By the end of breakfast, Lily decided that the damned bird did not deserve a wonderful name like Dahlia. It would only eat what Severus gave it. She also ate everything – bacon, sausage, toast, a cabbage leaf and Cheeri Owls. Severus was studying the Cheeri Owls box when she made a speech of croaky caws.

"I'll take a box of this, and some bacon and cabbage for her. That should keep her content till later. Does she go out after she eats?"

The girls shrugged in response so they went up to the Front Hall, and let her out the front door. Severus left it cracked open so none of them had to wait in the cold for her. The bird returned in approximately fifteen minutes with a squirrel in its claws. She dropped it at Severus' feet, and he picked it up to take with them, back to the dungeon.

"Once I put her away, what do you want to do?" he asked.

Greengrass said, "I suppose I should start on my letters of thanks for my presents. I'll see you tonight at six."

Lily's eyes got a mischievous look, and when Greengrass went into the Slytherin common room, she suggested, "Get rid of this, and bring a set of your new underwear. I have an idea."

New underwear might mean Lily expected him to get completely undressed. Severus only wanted to do that once. Well, actually never, but once was about as much as he could hope for. Underwear was equivalent to Lily's use of toothbrushes to start kissing. Except today would be shagging. In response, Severus did not betray his suspicions, but simply agreed, "Alright."

He returned to Lily outside Slytherin after he drank the _felix felicitus_ in privacy, and he guessed he was right by Lily's giggle as she grabbed his hand to lead him up to the fifth floor. She gave a password to a door near Boris the Bewildered and pulled him in.

This settled it. Lily Evans was fascinated by bathrooms, or else had some sexual attraction to them. Severus had heard there was a mermaid window in the Prefects' bathroom, and now he saw it.

"See how big the tub is?" Lily said, pointing at it. "We can take a bath together."

"Alright," he responded, glad she did not want to use the toilet again.

Lily turned on the taps, asking, "Any preferences?"

"Whatever you like," he answered, pulling out one bottle of mead and enlarging it. He also transfigured the cork into a wine glass and poured her a drink.

When he handed it to her, Lily frowned, saying, "I thought you said you got this for um … you know."

He shrugged and answered, "I can get more."

"It's still morning."

"How often do I get completely undressed for you?"

Lily took a sip, then another once she realized how much she liked this mead, and put the glass down. Giving Severus what she hoped was a naughty look, she slowly unbuttoned her cardigan and gave her hips a bit of a shimmy as she walked over to a bench to put her folded clothes on. She looked over her shoulder and found Severus right behind her. She was about to tell him to back up so he could watch, but he grabbed her hips and pulled her bum against his front and started rubbing himself against her. Her eyes widened since he seemed to like this more than her hand.

"May I unbutton the rest please?"

"Please do, Sev."

Severus handed Lily her glass, and then finished unbuttoning the last button of the cardigan. He then started on her blouse, starting on the bottom after he untucked it from her waistband. Severus had not finished with her blouse, when he slid both his hand under it up to her breasts and got his fingers underneath her bra, pushing the whole thing up to cradle both in his hands. He was lifting them a bit and let his thumbs rove till he was able to trap her nipples between his thumb and forefinger. Feeling dry-mouthed, Lily drained the glass. Severus kissed her sweetly, then released her to take the glass from her lifeless fingers and refill it.

He gave her the glass and finished unbuttoning her blouse. Lily's bra was still pushed up so she was not covered. Severus touched her lightly, resumed his hold on one side and bent down to suckle on the other. When he gave her that slight twist as he did the first time Lily asked him to fondle her breasts, she shuddered. Severus switched sides and Lily ran her free hand through Severus' hair in an attempt to stay rooted in reality.

Lily didn't know when she finished the second glass, but as Severus refilled it for her, she removed her clothes above the waist and folded them neatly. Before putting down her wand down, she turned off the taps.

She took a sip of mead as Severus pulled his ratty jumper over his head. They shared a heated look as he moved past her folding it to place on the bench next to her clothes.

Once he was behind Lily, Severus breathed, "_Confundo._"

He took the glass from her hand before she dropped it. It was quite by accident that he drained it. He gagged on the sweetness. After charming the taste out of his mouth, he got to work on getting them both completely undressed and all the runes drawn on their bodies with the improved solution.

Refilling the glass, he got Lily to drain another one, and filled it again and put it on the side. The first bottle was almost empty so he enlarged the second one. After he spend a little time getting Lily ready, he took a moment to admire the artistic beauty of the way her hip curved outward from her waist. She was too beautiful for him.

He began the spell as prescribed when he first entered her. Concentrating was hard. This was even better than Lily's mouth. Severus completed the spell, and felt he did it properly because he had felt a connection formed between him and Lily. It was intangible and insubstantial, but it was there.

With Lily still under the effects of c_onfundus_, he took care of getting himself ready and repositioned them. While they were physically tangled together, he reversed the charm and threw his wand over to his clothes.

Lily licked her lips. Hmm, mead. Severus was kissing where her shoulder joined her neck lightly, and she could feel his breath from his nose against the front of her neck. She blinked looking at the filled bathtub. Weren't they … she felt, and then looked down … Severus was definitely within her, and her legs were wrapped around his and held wide open with her sitting on his lap. Her back was to his chest, and one of his hands was massaging her chest while the other was playing below. Her legs were starting to twitch, but she was trapped. Severus upgraded his assault when she moaned and jerked helplessly on top of him.

He held her against him when she would have slumped lifeless to the cold tiles. "Sev," she groaned.

"Asking for more again and so soon? Lily ..." He stopped talking, and Lily felt him slide his hands to her hips. She didn't know what he was doing as he lifted her up a bit and shifted under her, releasing her legs from his. They were numb as she tried to gather them under her to get up, but that was not what Severus had in mind. His hands guided her movements, and she was too shocked to do more than grunt each time he pulled her against his body. She tried to evaluate what was happening, but Sev removed one hand from her hip and with a few moves of his fingers, she collapsed on the floor, drooling on the towel underneath them as Severus continued to shatter her consciousness to pieces. She barely registered that they only needed a broom underneath them to have her play for the Holyhead Harpies. Although at this point, Lily felt she was not the least bit photogenic. She was an unresisting, shuddering puddle.

Severus rolled her over onto her back and stroked her skin. After a couple involuntary jerks of her limbs, Lily started to ask, "Uh, Sev …" What was she to ask? She already forgot their first time, and she wanted Severus to fill her in? He was entirely undressed … Lily's eyes darted over him. He was looking down at her, with a concentrating look on his face as he traced his fingers down her side. There was an old yellow bruise on his shoulder. His chest was not pretty. It was thin, bony, marked up with remnants of old injuries, his nipples were alright she supposed, there was hardly any hair, but did she really want him hairy? He was sitting with his legs folded to the side so she could only see a little of the base but the rest was hidden.

She tried to sit up, and Severus aided her. Following the potion's impulse, he suggested, "Did you want me to help you over to the bath?"

"Yeah, that would uh … be good." That was why she put water in it earlier. She did not resist as Severus assisted her sleepwalking form to the water.

Even when Lily was sedate and cooperative, Severus was annoyed that her hand still drifted down to grab hold of his cock. It was sore now. Whoever said they were able to do it all afternoon and night had to be a liar. His balls were aching too. Unlike others, Severus did not think this was a 'good kind' of pain. Idiots.

She didn't let go of him so he had to crouch to help her sit in the tub. "Could you heat the water up a bit, Sev? It's cooled just a little too much."

"My wand's over there. Could you let go of me please?"

Lily giggled, let go and urged him, "Bring it back as soon as you can, I'm not done with it yet."

He shook his head considering that he imbibed _felix felicitus_, not Lily, as he went to fetch his wand. Why was he the one that was sore?

Her mouth dropped open as Severus turned to get his wand. What happened to his back? The marks were painful to view. From the front, Sev was thin, but the way his ribs and spine were outlined from behind with the discolorations crossing over them and growing heavier toward his arse where there was hardly an untouched portion of skin … Sev turned, cutting off her view of his behind.

"Oh, come on," he implored. "You're sitting there like a hungry baby bird. Let me at least wash it off first."

Lily closed her mouth. That was close.

Severus joined her in the water before warming it up. It felt fine to him, but he was able to tolerate it slightly hotter to please Lily. He _accioed _ her glass, but she put it down on the side of the tub. Since she wasn't telling him what to do, Severus summoned some flannels and soaped one up to wash Lily. This is what normal people did in the tub. He wasn't sure what turned on Lily about a bathtub, unless it was somewhere one was expected to be disrobed.

Relaxing in the reheated water, Lily marveled at how gentle Severus could be with her. He did not look capable of it, but his fingers felt wonderful anywhere on her body, not only on the naughty bits. He even picked up her leg and washed between her toes.

She hoped he'd let her wash him in return. Though how was she going to ask him about … all that? Lily felt really out of her depth. This was more than how stupid she felt after seeing the inside of his house.

He was washing between her legs, when he asked, "Is this alright? I don't know if I hurt you."

"I'm fine, Sev. You're wonderful. In fact, you are more than wonderful."

"Uh, thanks."

"No really," Lily insisted and gave him a kiss that turned into full frontal snogging as she climbed onto his lap. She let her fingers move across his chest and found that his nipples were also sensitive. Well, maybe not as much as hers, but Sev made little noises when she played with them. She squirmed about and couldn't stand it any longer so grabbed her favorite toy while running her other hand between her two new ones before she forgot about them as she took charge of everything else and held Sev's face against her chest while she rode him. Lily may not remember the first time, but this was bloody brilliant.

In retrospect, while she drifted back down to terra firma, Lily thought that she was calling everything with Severus bloody brilliant. Every new thing they tried, she labeled as 'bloody brilliant', and more 'bloody brilliant' than the last thing they did. She was as eloquent as a quidditch loving Gryffindor. Was Severus' body combined with her body her equivalent of quidditch? No, this was so much more bloody brilliant than quidditch, she thought with a big grin.

"Lily, I hope you don't take this the wrong way … I'm sure you can get in enough exercise on me to get me in shape to keep up with you, but all this is making me ache"

"Ache?"

"Yes, I know. Not a normal thing for a teen bloke to admit."

"Oh your uh … well, I guess before now we weren't sending your broom to practice every day. Now we'll have to because your my starting player."

"Every day?" Severus repeated, trying to ignore Lily's attempt at a sports analogy.

"You don't want to do this every day at least once?"

"With you, yes, but until we have some arrangement that permits it ..."

"You mean like married?"

"You said it, Lily, not me. I was thinking that, but you'd rather not talk about it?"

"Well I am now. I mean like … we're in love, but still in school, and have a lot to do after we graduate."

Severus savored the way Lily said 'we're in love'. Could she be willing to listen to him? The potion should be working to give him a perfect day. Not necessarily the day he wanted, but if he said something Lily didn't like, she shouldn't jump up and run out of here dripping wet. He made the attempt. "Lily, I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I don't find it selfish to want to start the rest of my life as soon as possible."

The rest of his life with her? Well, yeah, of course. It was rather silly for Lily to want Severus to be with someone else. Look at Mary. Lily's eyes narrowed as she recalled some of the things Mary had said about Sev. She knew his weaknesses, about him not trusting people and wanted to use that life debt to exploit it. If not for Lily, Mary would be the only person Severus would have a chance with, and she knew it. She was lying to his face, pretending she was interested in him, and then threw him that burden of a bird. All because she wanted to know that someone would take care of her. Anyone would do, and she knew that Severus was dependable, even though she detested every part of him other than his penis.

Lily was thinking, but she looked angry to Severus. He doubted he could express his feelings any simpler. It may not be what she wants to hear, but telling Lily the truth should be preferable to her.

She kept quiet while she washed Sev. He even let Lily wash his hair. Mary wouldn't do this sort of thing with him. Lily loved Severus, and was quite angry right now. Yelling at Sev wouldn't help. He didn't encourage Mary, and he didn't particularly encourage people to hurt him. If the four Marauders had been picking on Lily, instead of Sev, she doubted she'd cave in to their bullying. Not all of this was their fault, Lily suspected his father and there were hints that Slytherins hurt him too. He wasn't even entirely sure how he was hurt. This bruise that was almost gone was from a stone block falling out of the ceiling. What kind of insanity was that? Out of all times for the school to fall apart, it does it on Severus?

Once they were out of the tub, Lily made Severus show off his new underwear. He said it would take some getting used to. It fit, but since it was new, it wasn't stretched out yet.

Lily understood what he was saying, but it sounded strange to her that he did not find new clothing more comfortable. Other than his school uniforms, everything Severus owned was well beyond old.

While they were eating lunch in the kitchens, Lily suggested they take treats for their birds, get their cloaks and take them both outside. If her owl could tolerate the raven, perhaps it could stay in the Owlery. She didn't have to like it to realize keeping it in a windowless dungeon was not the best place for it.

Since Severus did not have to hike up to the Owlery to get his familiar, he had beaten Lily to the Front Hall. Lily frowned at him reading from a large book, and at Mary's useless gift, sitting on his shoulder.

"What's that?" she asked.

"There was a section on Norse runes. Maybe something will sound right for this thing."

Lily's lips quirked. He called it 'this thing'.

Her owl did not mind the raven, until it started taking food from her. It wouldn't take food directly from Lily, but it would swoop down on her smaller owl to take its treats. Lily yelled at it when it knocked her owl to the ground, but her owl was unhurt.

"Sev, did you see that?"

"Yes, I don't think it likes owls."

"Doesn't like … well, obviously. What are we going to do with it?"

"I don't know."

"You already said you can't keep it down in the dungeons. I agree with that."

"You don't like it, do you?"

"No, I don't."

"So you won't want to keep its cage in your room? You can let it out the window in the morning."

"What? Why … well, Mary wouldn't hurt it. Maybe make her see what an idiotic idea it was."

"That wasn't quite what I had in mind. I was thinking about it spending time outside, and then I could go into a courtyard to bring it in later. Owls mostly stay up in the owlery, but other familiars are either left in the rooms or get carried around."

"You want to carry it around?"

"Not really, but for the winter, it shouldn't be out all day, should it?"

"Maybe you can set up something nice for it in the clock tower."

"Perhaps. That is far enough from the dungeons, and if I hide the cage, no one will know I have a familiar, other than you, MacDonald and Greengrass."

"Doesn't a familiar have to be with you part of the time?"

"Do you spend time with your owl?"

"Not as much as I did when I first got her."

"So how much do you not like her?"

"What kind of question is that?"

"I was thinking of a name. Ravens are very prominently used in Norse tales so I don't necessarily want to name her after Odin's familiars, but maybe a name from their mythology might suit her."

"She's no goddess, Sev, or anything nice like what you said about Pandora meaning all-endowed."

"Fair enough. I was reading through this poem. The Völuspá describes the beginning, end and rebirth of the world. When the end of the world is described, the sun turns black."

"Black? You want to call her the Norse word for black?"

"No, Blakkr is kind of boring. The end of the world, or more correctly the twilight or end of gods is Ragnorak. The sun turning black is mentioned twice …

Now death is the portion of doomed men,  
Red with blood the buildings of gods,  
The sun turns black in the summer after,  
Winds whine. Well, would know more?

Earth sinks in the sea, the sun turns black,  
Cast down from Heaven are the hot stars,  
Fumes reek, into flames burst,  
The sky itself is scorched with fire.

Lily frowned. She'd prefer it got some boring name. Ragnorak sounded rather destructive and powerful. "Maybe. As you said we don't have to name it today. Once we do some research and maybe figure out her habits, something perfect will pop up."

Severus thought _felix felicitus _would aid with this. Wasn't it supposed to help him all day? If Slughorn brewed it correctly … his only real goal had been achieved. Lily was acting like herself. "Sure," he agreed.

"Let me say good-bye and then we'll take your girl up to the clock tower to see if she likes it."

Severus felt that Lily was putting on a bit of a show for his raven with the way she cooed over her owl.

It came over to him when he called it down, and settled on his shoulder. It favored his left shoulder. Perhaps it knew that he used his wand in his right? This threw Lily off because she usually walked on Sev's left. Now, she wanted to walk on whatever side the stupid bird wasn't on. Since Severus did not want someone restricting his right hand, Lily put her hand under his cloak, holding and stroking his bum. He didn't care for it, but wasn't going to take a chance that the luck potion brewed by Slughorn was effective for the entire day.

Looking around the room at the top of the clock tower, Severus critically noted that it was dark so the bird could easily hide, and there were a number of exits for her to escape. He lit the rafters overhead and saw there was plenty of room to make her comfortable up there, once they knew what ravens liked to nest in.

"Sev, come over here," Lily called.

He hadn't been paying attention to her once he saw she started cleaning the tower. The bird didn't need it spotless. "What?"

With both hands she grabbed the front waistband of his trouser and pulled him against her, "I want you."

He was about to complain, but there was a definite nudge in his mind that he should do this. Was it the spell somehow enslaving him to Lily's endless carnal desires, or was it the luck potion? Hoping it was the temporary effect of the potion, Severus allowed Lily access to his body after getting the bird off his shoulder. She went up to the rafters. He didn't know if he wanted it watching him and Lily. It was an animal, but it was supposed to be a smart animal.

The twin ache in his balls as he completed into Lily sitting astride him better mean that something good was going to come of this. How could he be punished for not spending his free time wanking instead of reading? This was so utterly wrong. Well, maybe not. Lily was so out of control she had gotten completely naked except for her cloak. Her breasts were exactly right. They were the same size as his palms, not the heavy, flopping melons that the others liked.

With a huge sigh of relief, Lily concluded her screaming, looking down at him with a genuine smile and a promise of more to come in her eyes. He couldn't blame her. The combination of his cock in her snatch had her barely able to continue breathing. Severus doubted she'd settle for less now that she knew she could get at least ten minutes of constant mind-numbing bliss this way. There was something physically wrong with her.

Rather than getting off him, Lily was trying to regain his interest by nudging her pelvis with his exhausted body still inside her, and started talking to him, "That was wonderful, Sev. You are so beautiful when I'm making you happy this way."

Puzzled if she was talking about his probable look of pain as his testicles were squeezed dry like a wrung out flannel, he lay quietly beneath her as she took his hands and rubbed them along her chest. When he continued without her urging, Lily sort of danced on top of him, raising her arms and shifting her hips more.

Although Severus did like what he was seeing, there was no chance that he would recover before Lily's impatience took over. He let his hands drift lower and she sped up in anticipation, eventually screaming out more than his name with "I love you, Severus." That was new. However, he realized that Lily was acting more like a male in this relationship so any declarations during sex were spur of the moment.

By the time it started to grow dark, Severus was exhausted even though he had spent the afternoon lying on his back. Lily repeated she loved him several more times during their hours up here, and even declared it during a break of frantic snogging.

Severus got himself sorted, and aided Lily in finding her knickers which had ended up on top of one of the supports holding up the bells below them. He wasn't sure how the luck potion had helped him up here. If Lily came to her senses over him, repeating what she said up here would not win him any arguments. Also, the most important rule was that potions did not create real love. This wasn't even a so-called love potion.

Lily bounced up from tying her shoes, and said, "You should change for the feast, Sev. If you need to, wear your uniform trousers and shirt."

He still had to go to some stupid feast? Why? Did anyone care? Well, Lily would want him there with her. They couldn't discuss shagging. Severus wanted to talk it over, and at least set some boundaries with what he was comfortable with. If they tried to address it while alone, Lily might try to molest him, rather than listening to a word he said.

When he reached the stairs, the bird landed on his shoulder. Had it been watching the whole time that Lily was desperate for him to fertilize her eggs? Did birds do it for pleasure too?

"Hurry up, Sev."

"It's not six yet."

"I know, but I don't want to get there late."

He rolled his eyes. Afraid to miss the beginning of some boring tale that would last all night? Or did she want to scope out a seat with access to multiple vats of gravy?

"Alright. Did you want to meet outside and go in together?"

"Sure, but don't dawdle."

Unhappy with his current physical state, Severus stripped everything off and used a liberal amount of soap and water in the Slytherin gents'. Spells didn't leave him feeling clean. Not knowing what Lily was going to do to him next, he dressed starting with more of the new underwear she had given him. He also put on his school sweater since it was too cold for just his white shirt.

It was a couple minutes before six when he met up with an impatient looking Lily.

"What took you?" she asked.

"Your smell is for me alone, Lily. I didn't want to share it with anyone," he replied lowly, and leaned close to give her a kiss. "Besides, their dull tales might not be enough to stop me from getting all worked up over the scent of you. I'd take you right there, bending you over the table, flipping your skirt up and pushing your knickers aside … "

"Sev!"

He breathed on her neck and warned, "Oh no. I may have washed it off me, but my dirty suggestions are getting you so roused, I can smell your heat. Lily ..."

"Stop!"

"Alright."

"I've unleashed a beast," Lily declared, as she turned to go inside.

Severus made a face behind her. He was a beast?

The sneer did not leave his face as he realized they were all going to eat at one table. There was an absolutely disgusting amount of food on it. Most of it rather foul, swimming in sauces and glistening oddly in the candlelight. Did the elves put some sort of sparkling charm on the meal?

Lily already decided to sit with Flitwick, so Severus sat on the other side of her. Lily's planned adventures might drown out the sound of Slughorn telling Cresswell about all the glittering and extremely important parties he had recently attended. If Slughorn was really that welcome everywhere, why was he having his Christmas feast at Hogwarts with Dirk Cresswell, mere brown nosed student?

Greengrass arrived shortly after they did, and took the seat on the other side of Flitwick. Severus understood why she'd prefer to sit there than next to him, but that left him with an empty seat that could be filled with a potential pain in the arse.

The next time Severus thought of using _felix felicitus _he'd find somewhere that would be undisturbed for six months and brew it himself. Slughorn had to have brewed the weakest version to ever turn a golden color. Dumbledore's ensemble was a walking punishment to all who viewed it. It was red velvet with winking spangles of red, green and gold. Atop his head was a gold embroidered matching cap with a festive fairy dancing upon its top, flat surface. As he came closer, Severus itched to find some doxycide.

Why the fuck was Dumbledore ignoring Slughorn's waves and calls indicating he had saved the headmaster a seat, to take the seat next to him? Severus would rather be hanging with that bathroom ghost.

McGonagall took the seat on the other side of the headmaster. Maybe she could assert some control over him, or at least listen to his rambling lies.

"Good evening. How are you all enjoying your first Christmas here at Hogwarts?"

Severus looked at Lily and Greengrass to politely listen to their answers. Since they were already in the spirit of their upcoming explorations, they mentioned their plans to the headmaster. The librarian across the table complained that the three of them were in the library everyday for the entire time it was open. Severus quirked an eyebrow at him, how was being in the library when it was open a problem?

"And how is your Christmas so far, Severus?" Albus asked the silent student sitting beside him.

Keeping his eyes on his plate, he shrugged, "Alright." Perhaps he should be celebrating this was the last holiday before he could apparate out of here. Well, go through the gates and apparate, but it was still gone.

Dumbledore then blathered on about the food, and started carving the turkey in front of him. It was sparkly inside too. What was wrong with all of them? The headmaster piled a plate high with turkey and other foods, then handed it in his direction.

Lily whispered, "Pass it along."

He took it and handed it to Lily. That plate ended up with Greengrass. The next with Flitwick, and then Lily's. The headmaster prepared another plate and handed it to him. Severus put it down in front of himself. If all the food was permeated with glitter, it didn't matter what he was given. Dumbledore served a plate to McGonagall before taking an extra loaded one for himself with his potatoes piled into a miniature castle before he rained gravy down on it. Competing with Lily to see who could drink in more greasy meat juice in one sitting?

Severus leaned back and turned towards Lily in the deep chair. Maybe the headmaster would leave him alone if he pretended to be fascinated with the girls' discussion with Flitwick.

Lily was doing most of the talking, with occasional pauses to get the teacher's permission for something. She was doing a good job of it. She already had curfew waived, could pack as much food as they could carry, and based on Greengrass' description of the Slytherin attendance sheet, could set up something similar to keep the professor informed of their progress. Lily was now talking about sleeping bags. After one night without a bed, he hoped her enthusiasm for that faded. Severus may not have much, but he was grateful to have a bed at Spinner's End. Other than when it got really cold when he was little, he got to sleep alone. He overheard some of the other children complaining they had to share beds or pallets on the floor. Although his parents shared, and he'd like to share with Lily, being squeezed into a small bed with two or three other siblings would be intolerable.

And why would she want to get so far from their beds that they could not get washed up either? If she sneaked in a shag, Severus would want to wash. He was not kidding earlier when he said that Lily's smell had been all over him. She'd also drive him crazy if they did not pack enough meat and gravy to satisfy her cursed appetite.

Pandora took a turn asking Flitwick questions as Lily glanced at Severus. She had felt him crowded next to her. Her food had been really good. Not as fine as home. It was a shame that Dumbledore forced a plate of meat and other items swimming in gravy on Severus.

"Did you want me to switch our plates so you can take your pick of what you want, pretending its seconds?" Lily asked.

"If you want mine, take it. I was thinking of picking up something in the kitchen when I went to detention."

"Tonight?"

"If I finish it tonight, that'll be it. Filch's list will be done."

"But … well, alright," Lily was feeling pretty full and may feel like going to sleep, rather than shagging some more. She was planning on making a dent on Sev's plate too before afters. She swapped plates with him and tucked in.

"Should I go now that Flitwick doesn't have any more questions for us?"

"Wait till pudding, Sev."

"I don't want pudding."

"Doesn't matter. There's always other stuff beside pudding. I bet they'll be crackers."

"I'd rather eat something more than crackers."

Lily swallowed and corrected him, "Not those type of crackers, Sev. The kind that pop with prizes in them."

He had no idea what she was talking about.

Albus turned from Minerva to chide young Severus for not enjoying the meal and saw that his plate had been cleared in the couple of minutes he had looked away. There were smears of potato and gravy on it, so he did not use magic to clear it.

He nudged the teen, calling "Severus."

The boy turned with a "What?" but his dark eyes suddenly dropped to the table as Severus momentarily forgot about the headmaster's choice of merry garment.

"I overheard you and your friends are going to put your spare time to good use exploring the castle. What secrets are you hoping to uncover?"

"I don't know."

"Just the feeling of freedom to go and do whatever you want?"

"I don't know what you mean," Severus replied. What did the headmaster think they were going to do? Even if he liked Greengrass, she was a bit young for him to be doing whatever with. Five years difference may be alright in old people, but what would he have in common with a first year?

"You know, the freedom of having the school to yourself for your first holiday here?"

"Who? Me?"

"Yes, my boy."

"This is my sixth Christmas here, and I've been here all five Easters, you dunderhead."

On the other side of Albus, Minerva broke out in laughter. When he looked at her, she shrugged and said, "He's right, you know. Severus has been here every holiday. I was only wondering what he'd say to straighten you out, dunderhead."

"I stand corrected than. I'm sorry, Severus, it must have slipped my mind with the dragonpox keeping Miss Evans here also. I've hardly seen either of you."

"We're busy doing homework. You've already heard we're in the library, Evans speaks to Prof. Flitwick, we've seen Prof. McGonagall a couple times. I mostly run into Mr. Filch."

"Mr. Filch? Oh ho, what are you getting up to?"

"Nothing. I do work for him to fulfill my detentions."

"Detention over the holiday?"

"Sure. Mr. Filch and I already worked it out. I'd rather just finish up what I have, rather than put it off till January."

"What about Mr. Filch's holiday? Surely you are interrupting it?"

"Not really. I let him know when I've finished something on his list. Mr. Filch can check it when he wants. I do perform the work to his specifications. Who do you think taught me what to do?" Severus answered getting angry that Dumbledore decided to stick his nose in where it didn't belong. He did not need Dumbledore telling Filch he could do more for him, or that he needed closer supervision.

Lily butted in, "Just go take a look at Myrtle's bathroom. I'm not fond of the color, but Myrtle wanted it gray, blue and lavender. Severus redid the drainage in the floor to prevent the overflows into the hall, besides the grout, fixing the mirrors and the sinks, and getting it all shiny again. He's doing a really good job for Mr. Filch."

Behind Albus, Minerva hissed, "Argus showed him how to fix things?"

Albus was puzzled by that. It didn't sound like either Miss Evans or Mr. Snape knew Argus was a squib, but the amount of work needed to redo a lavatory without magic, was better left to the house elves. He glanced down the table and saw Argus was enjoying dinner with Hagrid, and at the moment the two of them were draining their goblets.

"I do see Mrs. Norris sometimes. She's rather good at hiding so it's best I keep working till I'm done," Severus said. "From what Mr. Filch said, I don't think many other students actually do work for him. They mess things up more so those are the ones that he and Mrs. Norris have to keep their eye on."

"I've heard of them," Minerva agreed. Every Gryffindor that got detention proved incapable of following simple instructions. Some created devastation, rather than accepting their punishment. She commiserated with Argus many times after sorting the mess that some students only responded to the old punishments. If Albus took the time to see what some of these students did to Argus, maybe he'd change his tune.

Severus shrugged, "It's better I do the work than mess things up. Mr. Filch can keep me there much longer each night when there's school, and I have homework to get through."

"Very sensible," Minerva agreed.

"I do let Mr. Filch know when I'm done on a school night, and if I saw anything unusual I'll tell him."

"Did he ever find out why that stone fell, Sev?" Lily asked.

"Maybe. I think he was more concerned for Mrs. Norris. She was missing for a couple days after that. Even though I saw her after, so I knew she wasn't under it."

"That's right. She ran off with the rat."

With a glance at the uneaten food, Severus said, "The fattest rat I've ever seen. I'm surprised she could lift it."

The castle had wards against vermin so Albus asked, "A regular rat?"

"I guess. As I said, it was obese. I've seen lots of rats by the river where I live. This one was shorter, had light brown fur, instead of black."

"Did it do anything unusual?"

"Not really."

Minerva muttered to the back of Albus, "That was the night Pettigrew disappeared. You don't think …?"

"Highly unlikely," he replied, "but perhaps Mrs. Norris will have something to tell you about her conquest. Normal rats and other rodents should not be able to enter the school."

"A student could have brought it in."

"If it's as chubby as he said, it should have been down by the kitchens, or near a common room where there would be neglected food."

"Mr. Snape may have been mistaken about its physical appearance."

"I don't think so," Albus responded. "The area he lives in is highly infested."

Minerva frowned at that piece of information. She had known that he was poor.

Severus supposed waiting till the pudding and other desserts were served was worth the wait. Lily's face lit up in pure enjoyment. He had been seeing that look too much lately, but it was somewhat of a relief to see it directed at food. Unless she considered him just something else to consume.

Lily could not resist clapping her hands together. The blue flames from all the lit puddings illuminated the table. They weren't all though, there was pretty much a little bit of everything else. Cakes, cookies, tarts, and custards were all gayly spread out before her, along with crackers! Excellent. She was feeling bad that she had Severus sit through this. Why did Dumbledore have to be such a jerk and think everyone liked what he liked? Severus was sixteen, and old enough to choose his own foods without someone playing mother for him. And not a very good mother either, there were green veggies on the table, but none made it onto their plates. Lily's mother would not let them get away with that.

The pudding was not as good as home, but her mother used a secret recipe that had been handed down for generations. She pestered Severus, "You have to try a bit of this pudding, Sev."

"What's in it?"

"Nuts and fruit," she replied while getting a bit on her fork that contained some of the prized ingredients.

He made a face at the dark substance on Lily's fork that she was hovering in front of his face. Nuts and fruit weren't bad, so he let her put it in his mouth. This was not like any nuts and fruit he had ever had. This was disgusting and sticky. He couldn't decide if it would be easier to swallow it or spit. It was adhering to his teeth.

Not finding water within reach, Severus cast _a__guamenti _into his unused goblet to try to wash it down, or at least try to break down its viscosity. After a second goblet, he asked, "What's wrong with you?"

"What?" Lily replied.

"That was not nuts and fruit. Something was done to them."

"They are suspended in a base of suet, treacle and molasses and then usually soaked in brandy. Some people use beer."

"Why would I eat anything with treacle or molasses? And what's suet?"

"Suet's raw beef or mutton fat, but it's used in a lot of things, Sev. It's no big deal."

His mother may be a terrible cook, but she never gave him a lump of fat to fill up on. The others were eating it with true gusto. What was wrong with all of them?

"I do not eat such things, Lily. It could make me sick. I only had a little so I'll probably be fine."

Lily frowned at him. He may have a point, but Severus was going to have to adjust to eating more things. Maybe not steamed fat with molasses and treacle. That was a mistake on her part. It was a miscalculation that everyone loves Christmas pudding. "I didn't ask you to try it to hurt you, Sev. How about we split a cracker?"

She extended a colored foil paper tube towards him. When he did not grab it properly and let Lily snatch the whole thing back, she said, "Look on the inside and get a grip where you see that little brown paper tab. We both pull."

This was annoying. Why didn't Sev know what a cracker was? The Snape family may not do anything for Christmas, but the table was covered with crackers here. If Sev had been here for five Christmases, none of these … people … bothered to share one with him? Or were they only for the Cresswells and Potters of the world? She'd pull open every one tonight to show these toerags who was entitled to touch the crackers.

BAM! What the...? That was way too loud, Lily thought, as she coughed on the smelly blue smoke. It better have good prizes she continued to think as she blinked to see what had come out.

Severus handed Lily the flowered chapeau. Flitwick already had donned a top hat from a cracker he had just split with Greengrass.

Lily tried to give him the chess set, but he declined saying, "I don't care for games, Lily."

"But maybe we'll find a second set and then we can play."

With a smirk, he asked, "You want to play chess with me?"

Leaning close, she whispered, "We can up the stakes a bit. Strip chess."

"Will either of us have an incentive to win?"

"Probably not," she replied, finding the slip of paper with the joke. She turned it over to look at the answer, rather than reading it aloud. Her lips thinned in a very good impression of her head of house. "What kind of toerag joke is this? What did the magical teapot ask the muggle?"

Not having the right kind of sense of humor for such riddles, Severus commented, "It shouldn't say anything to a muggle."

"I like your answer better, Sev. This says 'one lump or two?'"

"Does that mean sugar, or striking him?"

"I guess that's supposed to be the funny bit."

Severus shrugged. He couldn't explain why someone would think that was funny. He'd only find it amusing if specific people were getting struck. Not random strangers.

Despite the disappointment with the joke, Lily insisted they open a second cracker together. It contained more worthless items. This time a frilly bonnet and a package of balloons. Lily did not bother to read the joke aloud, but crumpled it up.

That hunk of pudding was weighing heavily in his stomach. If he did not know it was a lump of animal fat, it probably would not bother him as much. There was a hinting nudge that he was supposed to go now. He asked Lily, "Is it alright if I go now?"

"You didn't get a hat yet, Sev."

"I don't want a hat."

Lily pursed her lips to reply, but gave it some thought before she blurted out the first thing that came to mind. How could she expect Severus to get in the spirit of things? Finally, someone opens a cracker with him? That was probably his highpoint of the entire feast. The headmaster shoved a plate of food at him that he wouldn't eat. Had someone done that to him for the previous five years? Did he even bother coming any more? If she wasn't here, would he be down in the dungeons reading? He'd be ignoring Pandora. His detention would force him to talk to Mr. Filch, but for some strange reason Severus didn't say anything bad about the caretaker. She finally replied, "Alright, but don't stay out too late. We are hitting the library as soon as it opens to sort out that bird."

"Whatever you say. So kitchens at nine?"

"Yes, and bring it with you so we can compare it to illustrations."

"It has to eat anyway."

She nodded. That was the beauty of having an owl. The house elves took care of it. Lily only had to worry about it when she was at home.

Severus slid out of his chair between them and exited the room through the nearest door without another sound.

Lily returned to talking to Prof. Flitwick and Pandora. He had a few suggestions to aid them. They were going to meet with him at lunch tomorrow because Severus had some paperwork he was putting together for them to target areas in the school. Once he mentioned arithmancy, Lily had left it alone. He wanted to verify they weren't accidentally going to break into the staff-only areas of the school. Lily agreed that would be both a waste of time, and would get them in trouble, even with permission to snoop around.

Hagrid loudly interrupted all conversation by calling for a toast. Once he had their attention, he raised his goblet and declared, "To Albus Dumbledore. Great man!"

Lily cooperated, rather than being the lone person not joining in, but what had Dumbledore done lately? He Who Must Not Be Named and his Death Eaters were occasionally mentioned in the paper, and their unattributed atrocities were in it constantly. So far this school year, two students were dead. Both were at the school when something happened to them.

She was glaring at the subject of their toast when he looked over to her and asked, "What happened to Mr. Snape?"

"He doesn't care for feasts and celebrations. Severus went to work on some things. He should finish Mr. Filch's tasks tonight to leave the rest of his holiday free to assist Miss Greengrass and I."

"Oh, right. Argus," he called, having been distracted by talk of the mysterious fat rat.

"Headmaster?"

"Mr. Snape has been doing work for you?"

"Leave that one alone. He's the only one worth anything 'round here."

Albus hesitated. Was Argus Filch saying something good about a student? "He's not too much of a bother to you than, Argus?"

"Bother? It's all those others that can't listen to a word I say. I've said many a time that the old punishments is the only way to handle the worst of them. They're a filthy plague infesting the castle, eating away at it."

"They don't mean any harm," Hagrid corrected his drinking partner.

"Harm? The house elves can't keep up wit' them. Between now and summer is the only time they have a moment to do maintenance. This is a big place."

"How long will you have Mr. Snape's assistance, Argus?" Minerva asked.

Filch shrugged, "Probably till he graduates. Got to keep the others away from him though. Jealous whelps keep undoing his work."

"Are you sure it was ever done?" Albus asked.

"Of course I check it, then some out of bounds rat sneaks over and destroys it before morning. It's not just undone, but worse than when he started. Got a lot done this past week without that scum here."

"Who assigned him detention till he graduates?" Minerva asked, getting back to the actual facts, rather than Argus' opinion of students.

"Madame Pomfrey," snapped Lily. "She and Slughorn have something against Severus."

"Prof. Slughorn," was chorused. Albus would be very disappointed if this student was being punished for St. Mungo's opening that investigation.

"Hm?" Horace asked. He had just been telling Cresswell about a Ministry award ceremony and ball he had attended.

"Horace," Minerva called to him, "why does one of your house have over a year of detention coming to him?"

"Who?"

"Severus Snape."

"Does it matter?"

"If it was assigned unfairly, it's up to his head of house to dispute it and negotiate a reduced sentence," the deputy headmistress reminded him.

"Why would I want to do that? He's trouble."

Having drunk more than he usually did, Filch sneered, "I'll take your troublemaker off your hands. You take all those foul muddy-shoed, snot-nosed rabble for detention. They can't even sweep a floor without me keeping an eye on them. They pull a rug over the dirt, and then run off."

Minerva was a little tipsy herself, besides feeling a keen disappointment in Horace once again. "I can agree to that. Most of the students in detention are Gryffindors, and Argus is correct that they are of no assistance to him."

"What good are they to me? I don't have time to watch students," Horace complained.

"It's part of your duties," Minerva sternly replied.

"Horace, I'm sure you given the opportunity you could do a great deal of good for the student body. I can only imagine how you'd show them by your fine example of how far they could go if they only applied themselves. It's rather selfish to confine yourself to a select few, like our fine Mr. Cresswell here. Look at how much he has benefited under your caring tutelage," Albus commented.

Sarcastically, Minerva added, "Yes, you are doing a fine job with Mr. Cresswell."

Dirk Cresswell preened beside Prof. Slughorn. With Slughorn's help, he was sure to go far. Perhaps, Slughorn would allow him to assist and put him in charge of these other students for their detentions to exhibit his supervisory skills. So far this holiday, he rarely ran into any of the students to exercise his authority.

Prof. Flitwick was sitting quietly. Some magic was at work here, but he was not sure what or who was benefiting. It was not helping Horace. Argus may be gaining a reliable helper, but if Snape already had a long-standing detention and did the work, it was not changing anything. Cresswell was in Flitwick's house, but he did not mind Horace singling some out for assistance. Cresswell had a real gift for languages and was a relatively good-looking lad, but he wasn't what a Ravenclaw like Flitwick would consider truly brilliant. Although they were using young Cresswell as an example, the boy didn't seem upset. He clearly enjoyed Horace's attentions, and had dined with the staff every evening thus far.

Lily's mouth quirked in amusement. Mr. Filch liked Severus' work? She wouldn't be as bold as to claim he liked Severus, since he disliked all students, but it was good that a member of the staff other than Prof. Abstractus appreciated him. And now Slughorn had to supervise the evening detentions. It wouldn't last because he'd weasel out soon enough, but at least Dumbledore and McGonagall were getting the true measure of him at last.

Lots of Author Notes:

AN: The jeering clapping and chanting is from the movie when Snape was a teen and attacked by the Marauders.

AN: The Mistletoe traps were used in other fan fictions. Usually in some embarrassing way, if I recall correctly.

AN: Interesting note from Wikipedia - Ten-pin bowling was introduced to the UK in 1960. Dumbledore started bowling in his 80s, or did he start playing elsewhere such as the US? Since AD's wizarding card is so specific on ten pin bowling, I doubt it's a mislabeled game of nine pin, lawn bowling or skittles.

AN: It was in the books that at least the potions' classroom was so cold that their breath could be seen.

Finally, really dumb mice keep coming into my house which is full of cats. The only good advice I can offer on that is not to do anything with it until it's cold, hard and what's left is curled up in a fetal position because if you dispose of a playing dead mouse, it'll come back in the house looking for a rematch if you don't go Van Helsing on it. None of my guys eat mouse bodies, just disembowel and pull off its feet.


	35. Chapter 35 Communication Breakdown

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

AN: Since the apparition instructor in HBP was so boring, I made the previous one equally boring so little has changed from JKR's text. My copy of HBP has apparition class on pp 382-386.

Chapter 35 Communication Breakdown

This was a young, female raven. Ravens were smart, could use tools, had a distinctive set of sounds to talk and could mimic human speech. Females were smarter than males. They could eat pretty much anything, and domesticated ravens could live to be forty or longer, if magical.

Lily still didn't like her, and wanted Severus to name her something lowly and unimpressive. That would send a clear message to Mary MacDonald. Trying to buy Severus' attention with a familiar that could be intelligent and possibly useful. So far, Lily didn't see her being too bright. She recognized Severus, but that was about it.

After that Severus took the time to explain to her and Pandora the work he had done around the castle along with calculations to find unknown spaces. He had been taking measurements while working for Filch, took some floor plans of Hogwarts available in the library and then put some arithmancy on top of that.

Lily was with him until the arithmancy came in. He had identified a lot of areas where something could be hidden, or just off-limits to students. Severus believed that it might take them a while to locate a way in since it could be through any of the surrounding walls, or even involve unknown stairs or ramps. There were also sections that he suspected contained pipes, based on the location of lavatories.

This was a more educated approach than Lily had in mind. She just thought they'd head to a hardly used section of the castle and start casting detection charms. Considering that this idea was hardly a week old, she was surprised by how much work Severus had done planning their investigations.

Pandora suggested they could also talk to portraits. If they have not been moved in a long time, they may remember something in their vicinity. A ghost would also be helpful, but she did not want to approach the Bloody Baron. He had a low tolerance level for student schemes.

***********************************

Minerva McGonagall found an opportunity to speak to Mrs. Norris about her fat rat. If a cat could roll her eyes, Minerva would be doing it. Mrs. Norris had a very high opinion of herself and how clever she was. She knew Minerva was not a proper cat so she broke down the basics for her, even though Minerva did not want any lessons in stalking, observing and most of all, patience.

Firstly, Mrs. Norris had observed the filthy rat boy many times. He had a distinctive, unpleasant scent. Most of the time, he pretended to be one of the filthy, mud-loving vermin who gave her person so much … fits? Minerva did not know how to interpret it, other than Mr. Filch did not like children dirtying the castle. However, Mrs. Norris was not allowed to touch those vermin, only tell her person where they were being especially filthy.

It was not until the filthy rat boy leaving his foul rat poo all around for others to clean, that Mrs. Norris' person told her to catch the rat. Her person did not understand when Mrs. Norris showed him the boy over and over. He has limited intelligence since he was not blessed to be born as a cat, nor did he admire cats so much like Minerva that he studied to make himself appear as one.

Mrs. Norris' person did not understand that she could find the rat very easy at any meal when the filthy vermin gorged themselves at their troughs in the really big room with the almost sky. He could only see him when he was a filthy rat.

The filthy rat was easily observed by the superior Mrs. Norris. He did the same things, but not in the same place. At night he would come out of his lair in the tower with the big picture and sneak. He sneaked after her person's new clean boy. The filthy rat was jealous that Mrs. Norris' person liked Mrs. Norris best and talked to the new clean boy. Her person does not like filthy vermin.

Mrs. Norris knew that her person told the clean boy where to go every night. The clean boy always went where her person told him. Mrs. Norris had checked on him because she did not like sharing her person. If she had to share him, she wanted to be sure that the clean boy stayed clean unlike the rest of the filthy vermin in the school. Minerva was not sure in what way Mrs. Norris meant 'clean', but suspected she meant Severus Snape. In people terms, the word 'clean' was not among the ones she would list describing her student.

The filthy rat would wait till the boy was done and break things. He was very bad and filthy. Mrs. Norris did not want to wait for her person any more because the filthy rat was giving him more fits. Mrs. Norris did not want her person having fits because he would not talk to her and give her treats.

Mrs. Norris followed and got the rat. She agreed he was a fat rat. No fight in him. No cunning. No attempt to escape. Couldn't even play dead right. Very stupid, filthy, fat rat. And now her person was very pleased with no filthy vermin in the school, and Mrs. Norris was helping keep things clean along with the boy.

Where did she leave him? She took Minerva on a tour of small, enclosed spaces that she had dragged the rat through and beat him against the walls. She repeated the important lesson of beating vermin against hard things like walls multiple times. Vermin must be beaten, thrown, clawed and bitten. Don't eat filthy vermin. Her person fed Mrs. Norris liver and fish.

Mrs. Norris finally showed Minerva where she had dropped the rat. Minerva could not resume her normal form in the tight space to cast any spells to light up the gap in the wall. It sounded like a drop when Minerva pushed a loose stone through. Perhaps a ghost or house elf could take a look, if Minerva could find her way back here. If that was not possible, perhaps summoning the rat body from outside these cramped spaces.

***********************************

They were pleased when Prof. Flitwick was so forthcoming. Upon examination of their unknown areas of the castle, he was able to mark some as off-limits. That made perfect sense since the teachers did not live in their offices. Lily knew where Prof. McGonagall's and Prof. Slughorn's quarters were.

She asked, "Professor, are there really quarters for married students?"

"Where did you hear that, Miss Evans?"

"It's in Hogwarts, a History and when Helen and Mary were serious about some young men earlier this year, they felt that waiting till graduation wouldn't be soon enough. With them being in another house and wanting to adhere to curfew and other school rules."

Severus was listening, but saw no reason to get his hopes up. If there were quarters, Lily did not say she'd marry him … ever, and she'd find something wrong with them. There was also Mary MacDonald. Lily would not want to leave her rooming alone. Mary came before Severus with Lily. Along with Petunia, her parents, and Potter's umpteenth chance at being the hero in Lily's eyes, no matter what he did wrong. Nothing Severus seemed to do was good enough. He had spent a good chunk of time on these floor plans, and Lily hardly gave them a second glance until she presented them to Flitwick. He was morosely contemplating that Lily would get rid of him once she found out about magical dildos, when the bird starting messing with his hair.

He shrugged at it to hop off his shoulder. That's about the only command he had gotten down in the past day. It did not want to return to its cage earlier. Severus did not want it around him too much because he might get attached to it. As soon as that happened, something bad would befall it. If not Potter, there was Mulciber, Avery and probably at least a dozen others in this shit hole that would torture an animal for the sheer joy it would bring to them. Smarter animals would please them more because they would understand the pain better. It was cruel of MacDonald to make a gift of her. This bird could live for decades, if it wasn't put in his care.

Filius nodded soberly at Lily's information. He heard a rumor about those two young ladies catching the fancy of two Slytherins. Such a tragedy. Minerva certainly had her hands full with those headstrong boys, but she was constantly thwarted by the headmaster. He couldn't imagine such monstrous boys in Ravenclaw. Personally, he had stepped in a number of times when they were bullying his students, but the punishments, or lack of them, hardy fit the crime. Only one was left in the school now, and Filius had seen him pestering Miss Evans and Mr. Snape. It was simply a matter of time before he did something horrendous to them too. If the headmaster would not listen, at least Minerva should be warned.

Distracted by his thoughts, Filius offered standard advice, "Seventeen is rather young to marry. I understand some families are forging bonds and would like them as soon as possible. In a way, they are preventing the young ladies from meeting others who may be better suited. Once they graduate, they are free to travel, meet wizards who went to different schools, or may have been ahead of them here at Hogwarts or from a different house so they did not get to become acquainted with them here."

"My friends were very happy," Lily replied. She was struck by Severus' statement about starting the rest of his life now, or as soon as it was legal. If she put him off, would something take their happiness away? Lily admitted she would be happier spending all night with Severus, and not solely for the shagging. She cared about him, and Lily was increasingly worried about him whenever they were apart. Even though he was used to being independent from a young age, he still needed someone. And not Mary MacDonald or her idiot bird that Sev brought along to lunch.

Pandora asked, "Can we start this afternoon?"

"I've hardly packed anything," complained Lily.

"We can start in inhabited areas, Lily," Severus said, looking over the revised floor plans. "If we go to this part here," he indicated by pointing to a hallway near the Hufflepuff common room, "we can mark the walls with chalk and then work our way back towards the kitchen for dinner. This will also test the charms with the journal we've given Prof. Flitwick, and give us a chance to hone what we will do elsewhere in the castle."

"It's not that big a space," Lily murmured. They wouldn't find anything exciting near Hufflepuff.

"We don't want to get lost on our first afternoon," Pandora responded. With Evans in charge, she'd think it wonderful to plunge them into the depths of the dungeons with a coil of rope and some hooks to climb their way out. That was not the kind of fun Pandora wanted. She wanted amusement, not danger. Snape's plan to have them work their way towards the kitchen was sensible. Until they started finding fantastic and long hidden secrets, Pandora was not willing to skip meals or sleep outside of her bed.

"That should be a fine start," Filius agreed.

Lily was still sullen when they rendezvoused at the far end of the corridor with their basic supplies to begin. Severus and Pandora were already there, and Sev had already charmed his lanterns. Most of them gave off a sunlight glow, rather than _lumos_ quality light. This corridor had not seen sunlight since the castle was built, unless someone had cast a spell down here. He also had a set of bullseye lanterns that were charmed to send their very white beams at gaps and cracks in the walls. Long, straight cracks would be a hint that perhaps a door or panel was hidden. Like Lily, he had committed a long list of spells to memory, but they had a cheat sheet to remind them of useful spells.

"Why did you bring the bird?" she asked.

"She didn't want to go back in her cage."

Lily made a face. He wasn't doing a very good job training it.

Severus did not pay attention to Lily's disapproval of the animal. It was sitting on top of a lit lantern, staying out of the way. He marked the wall with chalk. It was charmed to erase when a command word was given to the remaining pieces so Severus wouldn't have to walk around cleaning all this up before the students returned.

Their experiment worked. By dinner, they had found a closet packed full with Mrs. Scower's, a storage room for school dishes, another storage room with Hufflepuff linens and bed hangings, and another room that initially got Lily excited, but Pandora and Severus determined it was probably used by Hufflepuff prefects to relax and have quiet teas, based on the items in there. It was very homey and comfortable with its own set of dishes and linens in a cupboard, and a little stove for heating water in the kettle atop it.

In the kitchen, Severus took some fresh parchment and redrew that specific corridor based on the notes he took during the afternoon. His bird knocked over a box of Cheeri Owls onto the table. He'd pick it up once he was done, and she was done pecking at them.

Lily felt they had wasted their time. They should have started somewhere else. She was looking through the floor plans to pick someplace for them to try tomorrow.

Evans better change her attitude tomorrow once she picked where they were going, Pandora thought as she shoveled in her meal. She was a pure mudblood bitch all afternoon. Snape may have had dragonpox with her and was used to people being mean to him, however whatever she did other than mistletoe kissing with him couldn't be worth all this. He was doing most of the work, and all she did was complain. Pandora was going to spend a long evening soaking in the tub, and if things weren't better tomorrow, she'd find something else to do with her time.

"Alright, I think we should search underneath Gryffindor tower," Lily announced. "We'll start on the floor under the common room and work our way down."

"I didn't fill in much about that area because I don't know where the baths are for your house. Could you mark those locations? We can use that to guess where the pipes are," Severus explained, while looking at the lower levels. "There's a boys' lavatory on the second here, and then a girls' on the fourth."

"Me?" asked Lily.

"You are the only one of us allowed in Gryffindor."

"But I don't know all those measuring spells you were using," Lily said, not wanting to learn them because she overheard him enough now to know they were really long, and then Sev wrote down a lot of numbers. "Can't you just come in and look for yourself?"

"Uh … maybe Prof. McGonagall will allow it, if I explain why," Severus replied, uncomfortable because it would be very out of bounds, and with Evans being the only Gryffindor and probably wanting to shag, he wasn't going to be caught while looking at faucets in the gents'.

"That seems like an unnecessary bother," Lily ragged.

"We've done everything by the rules thus far," Pandora commented. "It would be a shame to get in trouble, and not be allowed to explore further before we discover something worth finding."

"I can ask her after I let the bird out. She should still be in the Great Hall. If Flitwick's there, I'll have someone to verify I'm telling the truth, or at least that we're snooping around the castle."

"Why wouldn't she believe you?" Lily queried.

"The head of Gryffindor is suspicious about Slytherins. She rarely believed my word against the Marauders unless there were other witnesses."

"She believed you when they undressed you in June."

"They also got the Head Girl. I wasn't a solitary victim in an empty corridor."

Lily rolled her eyes and sighed. Severus against the world again. Well, he may somewhat have a point. With all the lying around here, who would believe anyone when they told the truth? Especially when the staff decided to have petty quarrels with students. Slughorn and Pomfrey probably thought themselves untouchable with the absolute trust of Dumbledore. He was no judge of character. His years of favoring the Marauders were a testament to that. It was nothing short of miraculous that Severus wasn't the student they killed. Where would she be then? Would she still be forced to look at Black waggling his eyebrows at all the girls and laughing over his cleverness every evening in the common room? Was his expulsion contingent on someone getting killed, or someone people cared about getting killed? Potter all suave with his broom and messy hair, playing with a snitch, and slyly hinting to her that if she did not go out with him, that he wouldn't be able to protect her from being the Marauders' next victim? She knew Potter had some thing for her, ever since she walked out on him with Severus that first day on the Hogwarts Express. That's why she dropped Magical Creatures. She did not want to get raped after class with his buddies cheering him on.

Severus was no longer paying attention to Lily. The bird had played with the cereal and there was one circle, then two circles together, then three, then four and so on till she finished putting the twenty-first ring in the twenty-first pile as he watched. "Can this thing count?" he mused aloud, before pointing at the pile of three and asking, "How many are in this pile?"

Finally having her person's attention, the raven walked over to the small pile, and tapped the table three times with her beak, and then broke his 'keep quiet' rule by cawing three times.

Lily said, "Thank goodness you didn't ask her about the pile of ten."

The raven then went to the pile of ten Cheeri Owls, and gave it one tap to indicate she went there on purpose.

Lily scowled at the smug bird. Mary got him a familiar that could count because Sev liked numbers. She was such a toerag.

To the bird, Severus said, "I see you can count. I need to clean this up before we go." He charmed the piles of cereal back into the box and closed the top to take it with him so this box didn't accidentally get sent up to the Great Hall for breakfast.

"What about Countess as a name?" Pandora suggested.

"That's stupid," Lily replied. Countess meant nobility, and this feathered trojan horse did not deserve it.

"I should name it," Severus mentioned. Why did Lily care so much about the thing's name? Or was it simply in her nature to nay say any name that she did not choose herself? If nothing happened to it, this bird was going to live a long time, and it should have a name that Severus found at least agreeable. It was supposedly his familiar. Lily had her owl.

"I know," Lily grudgingly agreed. Though she felt it would be a symbolic slap in the face to Mary if she could get Severus to postpone naming it until after the holiday was over.

"Countess is alright with me, and I previously suggested Ragnorak. Since she's black, maybe Macabre, Morbid, Voodoo …?"

"Midnight," Pandora suggested.

"There's a lot of black cats named Midnight already."

"Yeah."

"Memento Mori is long, but it means a reminder that we are mortal and will one day die."

"You're right, it's too long," Lily concurred.

"Let me take the food the house elves made for her, and let her out. I'll see if McGonagall's in the Great Hall too."

"What about me?" Lily asked.

"You can come if you like," Severus responded. "I haven't let her outside since lunch so I think that should be first. If you want to go ahead and talk to Prof. Flitwick too, that'll be fine."

Lily stayed with Severus and sat beside him in the Front Hall while he waited for the raven to finish outside. "After we talk to the professors and put your bird away can we have dessert?"

"In the kitchen?"

"No, silly," Lily corrected him with a sudden grab and squeeze of his cock through his trousers.

"Oh. Alright."

"Don't you want to?"

"It's fine, Lily. I … I'm not sure how we're going to have time for everything when classes resume."

"Oh, alright. I was worried you didn't like what we did yesterday, Sev."

"The physical sensation was better than I thought it would be."

"Physical sensation?"

"Yes, there's so much between us, Lily, that physical is only a part of it."

Lily made a face at Severus. He was thinking too much. The 'physical sensation' was bloody brilliant. She didn't have time to think about more than that and well, the next time she could feel it. Maybe they could ditch Pandora and shag all day in some new place they found.

The raven returned without any animals, and they went into the Great Hall. The only student eating dinner with the teachers was Cresswell. Lily fought the urge to jinx him as he laughed at something Slughorn said.

The writing charm was working, according to Flitwick. He tried to encourage Lily because they had found rooms, just not fascinating rooms. Between Severus and Flitwick, McGonagall understood what they needed from Gryffindor. They settled on Flitwick making a copy of the current map, and he would update it with the pipe locations tomorrow morning, and return it to them when the library opened. Lily did not care for that arrangement, but Severus was not objecting. He'd also made a copy of Severus' mostly blank floors for upper Ravenclaw tower to update for them also.

On their walk down to the dungeons for Severus to put his bird away, Lily started getting a bit heated thinking ahead to what they'd be doing very soon, but not soon enough. While she was outside the Slytherin common room, she squirmed in anticipation and even squeezed her breasts roughly to try to find some relief. It didn't work and the urge was pounding in her, matching her own heartbeat. What was taking him so long?

Severus came out of the common room door, no more than five minutes away from Lily, and she grabbed him roughly, demanding, "Did you do something to me?"

"Huh?"

"I got to have you in me now. What's with that?"

He studied Lily, doubting it was something he had done, and recommended, "We could look up lust and love spells and potions in the library if you think I did ..." His spell would not be detectable to those methods.

"I don't want the library, Sev … hurry!"

"What?"

Taking advantage that he was wearing his non-uniform trousers which were loose in the waist and held up by braces, rather than a belt, Lily shoved her hand in to grip him. Sev wasn't even hard. Oh no. "Stop thinking and stop talking unless you are going to say something sexy. Like last night … you're going to reach under my skirt, and push my knickers aside."

"Lily, if you don't know if ..."

"I want it," she confirmed that with a painful pull of his penis.

"Not in the hall," he complained, trying to pull her hand out. "What if ..."

"Move it then and get these trousers off."

"There's a room down this way that isn't warded well. I don't think Greengrass ..."

"I don't care."

Severus considered _stupefy_ing Lily. Something had her out of control, and it should not be what he cast on her yesterday. She was fine then. Insatiable, but that was normal for her. This was ridiculous. Maybe after he took care of this, they could try to figure out what happened during that brief time they were apart.

He unwarded the door and Lily could hardly wait for him to close it behind them before she was undoing the front of his trousers. By the time he warded the door, she was on her knees with her mouth on him, and he barely remembered the silencing spell. He cast a dim lighting charm in the room. It was a small, spare potions lab, or it would be if Slughorn encouraged students to undertake private projects. He liked to keep an eye on his potions favorites and they used his classroom, so they could listen to him talk all evening.

Unsure of what got Lily so worked up, he rewarded the door strongly. Lily pulled off of him and chided, "Stop casting things, Sev. Is this hard enough?"

"Uh …"

Lily didn't wait for an answer, but pulled him over to the table. He had little choice about following since she was steering him with her death grip on his cock. It was a relief when she released her hold. The strange thing to Severus was that it had made him harder. Lily turning her back to him, bending over the table and flipping the back of her skirt up, encouraged him to stop rationalizing why his body could have liked that. He was admiring Lily's knicker-clad arse, even when she started waggling it, before she hissed, "Stick it in already."

Reaching down, Severus explained, "I just can't do that if you aren't … oh, well that doesn't seem to be a problem." He felt that Lily was more than ready so he pulled the crotch of her knickers to the side and got to work.

This was exactly what she needed. Severus was not even in her fully when she felt immediate and undeniable relief. How could she have gone over twenty-four hours without this feeling? It was so addictive, and Sev could make her feel this way over and over before he was done. Him being slow was so bloody brilliant. And here she was thinking he was bloody brilliant again because he felt so wonderful in her. He could go faster, and deeper, and more, more, more …

There was a definite advantage to Lily being on top. She stopped complaining. Severus did not mind her moving against him, but she had a different tempo in mind until he got his fingers under her to slow her down by concentrating on what he was doing there, rather than the fast as a rabid rabbit speed that Lily was trying to urge out of him. When she degenerated into over a minute of encouraging grunts, it drove Severus over the edge. Like each time yesterday, Lily joined him at the end. There was so much he didn't understand about this. He was still trying to get his thoughts together when Lily wiggled out from between him and the table. Rather than accusing him of doing something to her again, she started taking off her clothes.

Seeing Severus merely looking at her, Lily encouraged him, "Take yours off too."

"But what about you thinking that someone put you under a spell?"

"Got you moving fast, didn't it?" she asked with a big grin. "Next time I think it'll be something like shag me or I'll die."

"What?"

"I was playing with you, Sev. You should have seen the look on your face, and then you're talking about the library."

"You are alright then?"

"Other than being desperate for you to shag me after you gave me that naughty suggestion of yours to stew over for more than a day, yes, Sev, I'm fine. Now get those trousers off, I didn't have time to figure out whatever you got holding them up."

"You should warn me that you want to play something, Lily. I considered stunning you."

"Stun me? Why?"

"You led me to believe that you were the victim of some magic."

"So? What's wrong with us shagging, now that we've already done it?"

"If it's for the right reasons, nothing is wrong."

"What's wrong is you aren't getting undressed," replied Lily, who now was completely naked and not the least bit shy in front of Severus. She placed her hands under her breasts to push them up, and asked, "Are you going to let these go to waste, Sev?"

"What did you have in mind?"

"I'll help you get undressed, then you'll sit down on this chair, I get on top of you, and then these should be at the right height for your mouth."

"You've already planned this?"

"I spent all night thinking about all the ways we can do this, and I want to get started right away. Stop stalling," she said, and bent down to untie his old work boots.

"Do I need to get completely undressed?"

"It doesn't bother me, Sev. I love you just the way you are."

"You love me?"

"Yes, I've loved you for like forever. You aren't beautiful like uh … I don't know some muscled weight lifter guy, but you are all mine. Every blessed inch of you," she said, reaching up to the part of Severus that she absolutely could not resist. "Uh, what's …?"

"That's from the two of us."

"From … oh. Does it taste like … no, it's different."

"Well, you are added to it now. Should I get rid of it for you?"

"Um, yes, I don't think I'm ready for that yet, Sev. Though knowing how fast I am going sometimes, I'll probably wake up craving it for breakfast tomorrow."

"Lily, have you considered that maybe there is something other than your natural enthusiasm making you so … eager?" Severus asked, before casting _evanesco _on himself.

"I gave it some thought, but I don't think so. If it was lust, wouldn't I just want to shag you rotten all the time? And a love potion isn't really a love potion, and if I did drink one of those by accident, I wouldn't argue with you. I'd just think everything about you was absolutely wonderful if I took a love potion."

"How quickly your tune changes, Lily."

"What? No, I mean, we disagree over little stuff, and I find your reluctance to do what I tell you immediately aggravating. When I say strip, I want you naked in less than sixty seconds, Sev."

"I don't like being naked."

"You are going to like it with me, and that's that. Now let's get this jumper off you so I can figure out what's keeping your trousers on."

"It's only buttons on the inside, Lily," he replied, undoing the front ones.

Lily did not let go of his jumper until he lifted his arms. She nodded in approval seeing he was wearing his new underwear, and pushed her hands under the front of his undershirt to raise it high and get her fingers on his nipples. She hadn't studied these enough yesterday and tried sucking on one of them. To stop Sev's squirming, she released her hold on his second nipple, grabbed her favorite way to get his attention, and began sliding his foreskin for more bloody brilliant shagging. Her second hand slid down his back, to the waistband of his underpants and pushed them down. She realized they weren't going to come off unless she let go in front. While she was torn on whether she wanted to let go of him, her hand was creeping around feeling the unevenness of his bum.

"Stop," Severus said, grabbing her chin to stop any arguments and twisting his body away from her, ignoring that she was reluctant to release him, or even stop the pumping motion of her hand on his shaft. "Don't touch me like that, Lily."

She knew what Severus meant, and did not want to get into an argument over something that he was obviously so sensitive about. It was going to take time. "Alright, I'm listening, Sev. How about you finish getting undressed, and have a seat?" He did as she asked, but he wasn't going fast enough. She tried to hide her impatience, especially when she saw that he had … sort of lost interest. She repeated, "Sit down, I'll take care of that." It was sort of Lily's fault, she shouldn't have upset Severus when she was trying to get him in the mood to shag.

Speculating on what she wanted to do, Lily realized that Sev had cleaned himself off like she wanted. Maybe she should have done that to herself since gravity was pulling thick liquid out of her, where she could feel it slowly dripping down her inner thighs. Till now, she had only seen his thing while he had trousers on. Well, until yesterday but she hadn't taken a chance to look at it all, unless it was during that part she forgot.

Kneeling down, she felt, rather than saw, Severus cast a cushioning charm. Her eyes were focused on … what they always focused on. How could she find this part of Severus so fascinating? It was kind of repulsive looking and maybe even alien, since she was a girl. As Sev said, Lily looked with her hands so both of them cradled it. It was still heavier than it looked. She smirked as she felt it twitch. Severus was anticipating her doing something. No need to rush now that Lily got that pulsing sensation drowned with whatever was leaking out. Whatever was going on down there was not sexy feeling. Lily took her time, examining and playing with the part she usually did while holding it up so she could see what had been hidden to her before. She wished there was more light in here. Lily did not see two separate … things. Was this normal or not? She let one of her hands slide lower to the base of his penis, and then lightly moved it over this thing. "Is this alright, Sev?" She didn't want to upset him.

"I don't know," he murmured.

"Say something if I'm bothering you," she said, as she got her hand under it, and lifted it. She didn't move it much. What could she do with this? Sev showed her how to slide the skin on the main part, and she got the mouth idea from some of those dirty pictures. Lily leaned closer and stuck her tongue out. It tasted like … skin. It was thicker and wrinkly. She moved her second hand down to feel this more. His penis did not stay up and smacked her face on its way back down.

"Sorry, Lily, I didn't know you were going to let go," he said as he pulled it back up and out of her way.

"S'alright," Lily said, more shocked than hurt. Touching him here, or at least like this, was not doing the trick. If Severus was immature, he'd be laughing at her. Since he wasn't in the mood, Lily felt she might be able to get a couple questions in. "Can I ask you about this?"

"I guess."

"Um, is there supposed to be two?"

"There is. It's winter so they are closer to my body to keep warm. It'll look quite different in the summer, or if it was really hot in here."

"Oh," she replied, and grabbed a little tighter and sort of felt something inside.

"Don't grip it any tighter than that. You can shift them, if you want though."

"Will that feel good to you?"

"Not especially, but if you're careful, it won't hurt."

"Maybe when I can see better. I don't want to risk it."

Severus liked Lily's response, but he'd rather she did not study his balls at any time. He removed his hand when Lily returned her attention to his cock. She hardly pulled the skin back when she put her mouth on him. With the lack of warning, his whole body arched at the sensation.

Lily smirked at surprising Sev like this. She had thought about those pictures, either the wizards were much smaller than Severus, or the witches had huge mouthes. She wasn't sure if she was doing it right, but Sev wasn't complaining about all the spit leaking out of her mouth and obviously was liking it.

Not much time passed before he muttered, "Now would be a good time to switch."

Not understanding, she let him slip out of her mouth and said, "Huh?"

"Your scheme to sit on me."

"Oh yeah," she said, scrambling to get off the floor.

"Careful," he warned, getting her hands on her hips to slow her down. "I don't think it'll all fit."

"It did yesterday."

"No, you were facing the other way, and later when you were kneeling, not all of it was in you."

She rolled her eyes at him, and lined it up. Her knees buckled as soon as it entered. Oh … how good it felt. Sev had his hands on her bum now, and was both holding her up and she squirmed trying to figure out if he was consciously spreading her cheeks. It felt kind of good. Like anything could feel more bloody brilliant than having him inside her. Lily ignored Sev's advice and ground herself downward … ouch! There was a limit to how bloody brilliant he felt, as she lifted herself off. With her feet flat on the floor, Lily was in control of how far it went, and played around a bit. It fell out a couple times as she tried to feel the head where it was wider at her entrance.

Eventually, Lily got serious about it, and Severus adjusted to her increased pace and moved one of his hands to the front to get her concentrating on how absolutely fabulous this was. With her stopping herself from falling fully on him, she felt Sev's other fingers doing something from behind. Just the memory of the last time he had touched her there got her shuddering till her legs gave way. She felt no pain as Severus pulled her against him. She felt faint, he had never been this deep within her, and yet she was hyperaware of him pulsing within her while they held each other motionless in this moment of ecstasy.

Blinking, not sure if she had momentarily passed out, Lily felt her muscles contract around him. She was not supporting her body on her legs so he was still completely buried in her. One of his hands was on her back, and his head was bent while he suckled on her, and the other was gently playing with her other breast. Even though they were not moving, another wave of pleasure overtook her. If her sanity wasn't at risk, she'd never leave this position. This was absolutely bloody brilliantly perfect.

She resisted parting when Severus looked up at her by grabbing his head and keeping them in a long snog while she tried different ways of rolling her hips and clenching her muscles around him. The only thing that broke their lips apart was her cries of pleasure when she couldn't take it and had to throw her head back, rather than moaning into Sev's mouth.

Severus kept their lips apart and mentioned, "Whatever you are doing, it's working."

"What?"

"When you're squeezing me."

"Like this?" she asked, gripping him internally.

"Exactly."

"Oh? Can I move more?"

"Be my guest, Lily," he suggested as he resumed fondling her chest. He quickly moved one hand behind her to catch her as she almost arched off him and backwards to the floor.

Lily did not notice as she was also falling over the edge in her mind as she tried to get him deeper within her. She'd draw back a little and then plunge onto him repeatedly. She was so close to finding an even better sexual experience with Sev. She rode through several waves until he finally could no longer take it and grabbed her to hold her still as they once again jointly lost track of all reality outside of where their bodies joined.

This time Lily was aware of the excess amount of liquid leaking out of her and onto him since her legs were still apart. She looked at him expecting either disgust or laughter, but all he did was raise an eyebrow at her. That's what she loved about Sev.

***********************************

Lily realized the next morning that she was acting crazy as she spread out naked on her bed in the sunlight. She was thinking of Severus, remembering how much he said he liked being held last night after he … uh, cleaned up the mess. She wouldn't let him put his clothes back on when he suggested they could lay down next to each other. Lily wanted him here right now so she could see him properly, and feel the way he trembled against her while she softly kissed his face and ran her fingers through his hair.

She scooched her bum over the crumpled blankets before turning over, trying to relive how they got entangled in each other's limbs. Eventually, just like last night, Lily got all bothered and wanted him in her again, but now she had time to think since Sev wasn't here to fill … this sudden gaping void between her legs. Shagging had to be the most addictive thing ever. Whenever she thought about it, which was constantly, she felt empty and wanted Sev intensely. Did people still feel this after they were married, or was it children that quenched this fire? Lily couldn't imagine her mum all hot for her dad's thing. They certainly did not have silencing spells, so she knew neither of them were screamers like her.

What did Severus enjoy? He liked little affectionate things, when it was only the two of them. He'd be content to lie beside her, staring into her eyes and holding her hand still, like they had for years. Lily was getting the feeling that it meant more to him than the shagging, or maybe it was because he was more afraid when she was paying attention to him? Lily concentrated on him when she wasn't turned into a mindless ...slut? That was Petunia's word for it. Sometimes in the heat of the moment, she was barely aware of Sev, other than his thing in her. Yes, when she wasn't enjoying his penis, she saw the rest of Severus. There were still boundaries that he did not want her to cross. Lily had gotten him to completely undress twice now so she did not believe anything impossible with him anymore. She had to be patient and let things occur naturally so Lily could continue peeling back the layers to get to Sev.

With a huff of frustration she looked up at her Famous Wizarding card. He got up to a lot when she wasn't around him. She no longer believed it was palling around with Death Eaters and learning Dark Arts that took up his time, but Sev was smart and knew things she didn't, and not just useless things like Runes and Arithmancy, but spells that weren't being taught to students. If they were together at night too, Lily could know more about him and maybe learn things, when she was able to stop shagging long enough. She laughed aloud at the image of Sev trying to read a book in bed while she kept trying to pleasure herself on him. Maybe he could read dirty stories aloud to her. If they couldn't find any that she liked, she'd write some.

***********************************

Minerva was frustrated, especially now that Albus and Filius were also summoning rat skeletons from the walls of a castle that was supposedly vermin-free. At this rate, they would never recover what could be Pettigrew's body.

Based on what Minerva learned from Mrs. Norris, Albus had to also conclude that Peter Pettigrew was probably an animagus with the form of a rat that met his end while sneaking around out of bounds. Further damning was the loosening of that lintel stone in the corridor Severus Snape was scheduled to work in that night, and the same corridor where Mrs. Norris found the rat hiding. From that vantage point, either a rat or a student could easily hide to view and commit a horrible crime. The expulsion of Sirius Black was apparently not enough. The only question that remained was about James Potter. Was he part of the scheme to discredit Gryffindor? Were these boys acting on express orders from one of Tom's lieutenants, or were they taking it upon themselves to continue targeting Mr. Snape? Filius said that Potter had been following Snape after class since his return from suspension. That was a troubling concern, if Albus allowed Potter to remain at the school, the other students would still be in danger. He'd visit with the Potter family later today, and make a decision.

Disappointed that they kept retrieving the wrong rats, at each possible access point to the place where he was last seen, Albus vanished them. He looked at the corridor and tried to remember that there was another reason for him to want to visit here. A muffled, forlorn moan spurred his memory, and he entered the nearby girls' bathroom.

Minerva called, "Albus!"

"No worries, Minerva. This ladies' is only occupied by Myrtle, or usually is," he corrected at the sight of a well-lit lavatory. The circle of sinks had shiny faucets and a clean mirror stationed above each one.

There was a snarl of "Boys aren't allow ..." that petered out to Myrtle saying, "Oh, it's you. You're looking a fair bit older. Too busy to visit?"

"I stopped in to see if you are pleased with the changes in here. It is your home, and I do respect that, Myrtle."

"Well," she said while picking at some spot on her face, "I guess there will be more girls coming in once classes resume. I've been getting a real shortage of company, except for that really naughty girl who befouled my favorite cubicle."

"Really?"

"I would say more but uh … the fellow that was with her when I saw them up in the prefect bath, he's gotten enough punishment already. I wouldn't want him to get beaten more on account of me. He did clean everything up when I told them to leave so I suppose that's alright if they don't do anything bad in here again."

"Who got beaten, Myrtle?

"My lips are sealed," she replied, using her fingers to make a twisting motion in front of her mouth. Myrtle did not like Severus putting drains in the floor, but he had done more than the minimal amount of work other boys have done over the years in here. He was too good for that girl. Myrtle was not going to forget the first time she found them in here, with him kneeling in front of her, trying to do everything to please her.

"Is he a prefect?"

"Uh huh, I'm not telling. Pringle has nothing on the new guy if that's an example of his work is all I got to say to you, _headmaster_."

"Do you know anything of real interest?" Minerva asked, not caring for this ghost's tone.

"Me? Girls are crying about the terrible bullying by boys that are opening their blouses and flipping up their skirts. I don't think Headmaster Dippet would have allowed that, but that was years ago and I suppose I'm just old-fashioned about that sort of thing. Have you seen how short some of the skirts are these days?"

"Those ladies are violating the dress code. The length is supposed to be to the knee, just as it's been since you were a student," Minerva informed Myrtle.

Albus had been thinking. It wasn't the prefect, but who she'd invite in with her. Myrtle did accuse her of being naughty, not him. Severus might have gotten on her good side with the fine job he did in here. Argus Filch and Myrtle. Inconceivable, he thought with a slight grin.

"I think that has dwindled some," Albus mentioned. "It's getting rather cold this winter. The merpeople's predictions say it's going to get worse, before it gets better."

"That's only for those that can still feel it," Myrtle said smugly while rolling her skirt into her waistband, imitating the fashionable girls who wore their skirts so they barely concealed their knickers.

***********************************

After breakfast, they had to wait in the library for Prof. Flitwick. Lily was looking for something exciting to read to take her mind off wanting to jump Sev, when she saw him beckoning to her from a set of far shelves. She wasted no time sneaking over, in case he wanted to take care of the annoying itch she had between her legs.

He barely looked at her, as he asked, "Were these books here before? This one here might be good because I don't know if you'd want to cast ..."

"Can you put your hand in my knickers, Sev?" she hissed.

"Are you mad?"

"It doesn't hurt to ask, does it?"

"Lily, you scream. You can't scream in the library."

"What if I be quiet?"

"Would you have any fun then?"

"I guess not." She looked at the titles in front of her. "Where'd these come from?" she asked.

Sighing, he explained, "That's why I called you over here. I don't remember these. This book might be interesting. I was thinking that over the holidays while we're away from school, that the one charm Madam Pomfrey showed us might not be the best or the most convenient. However, whatever you feels right, is fine with me."

Lily took the slim book from him. It did contain different contraception charms, but there was other ones in here for witches. She flipped through it looking for something to cool her down, or at least get her sex drive down to a low idle. "Wait, I don't need to have a period?"

"What?"

"Um, don't worry about it, Sev. It's uh, well, I guess if I can't get enough of you, this would be handy so we don't make even more of a mess."

"There's a potion for that. I guess this spell would work just as well."

"What potion?"

"It's simple to make, I don't know the recipe since I don't need it, but it's available to … I thought all the girls at the school. Greengrass might know."

"Don't go asking her, Sev."

He shrugged, and mentioned, "Why don't you take that book out than, if it has other stuff in it? I saw there was spells that worked for a month. I think Pomfrey's needs to be cast every time, and with all the times you want it repeated, it may be more convenient."

"What's in the rest of these?" Lily asked, pulling out How to Please Your Wizard. She flipped through the housekeeping section until she came to what could have been something hot, but it wasn't. Some idiot wrote this and it was full of 'your man is king of the castle' crap. She might give Sev a foot massage, but it certainly was not written in stone as a daily right from his devoted wife after his hard day of toil. Maybe Lily would like her feet massaged since Sev did such a wonderful job washing and kissing them. Her toes curled just at the memory of how delightful that was.

She shoved that book back, and whispered, "Did you find any sex books?"

"Why would you need that?"

"I want to learn more of what I can do to you, Sev."

"I'm alright, Lily. Maybe once you aren't so … overstimulated."

"Over … overstimulated? Mmmm, I suppose you are right. I don't know what I'm going to do when classes start back up. Maybe you can put your hand in my knickers between class?"

"Lily, I … maybe that's not the solution. There's so many ways we could get caught."

"Maybe I can get by on two shags a day? One at breakfast, and one after classes?"

"I guess I need to ask again – are you mad?"

"Maybe. Aren't you flattered a bit, Sev?"

"I don't know."

She pouted at him, before grabbing his hand and kissing it. Giving each of his knuckles a peck, and cooed, "I'll wait, but I hope you don't keep me waiting long, Sev."

"Aren't we dissecting your tower today?" he asked. Severus could no longer tell what Lily wanted, except sex. Even in the library, she was now obsessed with it. Although it was new to both of them, he could accept that they couldn't do it all the time, especially once classes resumed.

"Yes, we are."

"Alright. Let's see if Flitwick's here yet, rather than having him find us over here."

"Why? Nothing here is particularly exciting," Lily bemoaned.

"Perhaps the books you would like are in the restricted section."

"Oooh, I bet you are right," Lily said with a gleam in her eye. What could she research that would get her a pass?

"They are also for sale, Lily, if you are that keen on them."

"Really?"

"Yes."

"Have you seen any?"

"Most fellows prefer the kind with pictures, so I didn't need to get a good look at one."

Lily giggled at her friend's disdain. "Do they have ones of men?"

"I guess there would be. I haven't seen any of those lying around in Slytherin, but with the prejudice and all pure bloods must make little pure bloods, that might be a secret that I haven't worked on uncovering. Besides, why would I want you looking at that sort of thing when you think mine is so … broom-like?"

"It'll keep me from getting overly curious and bursting into the gents'."

"I will not assist you with any scheme to do that."

"Well, I could always claim some sort of prefect privilege."

"I don't think so, or male prefects would be in the ladies'."

"Stop being so sensible," Lily replied as they joined Pandora and Prof. Flitwick.

"Miss Evans," Filius chided, "you should value someone sensible. Especially if you are as adventuresome as you are. I think more Gryffindors could benefit from your fine example. If Dirk was not tied up with a project with Prof. Slughorn, I'd offer his assistance."

Lily made a face at the thought of Dirk Cresswell tagging along. Severus had already distracted Prof. Flitwick with a question about Ravenclaw so he did not see Lily's obvious opinion of his promising student.

Severus was annoyed because Flitwick suggested Cresswell could do something he was not, quickly deciding to stay friendly rather than sulking, he asked about Ravenclaw's diadem and what Prof. Flitwick knew of his own tower.

Pandora thought Snape was kissing up to Flitwick a little much. Obviously, he was helping them so allowances had to be made. However, a Ravenclaw be of more use than a Slytherin? It was aggravating that their own head of house considered those with connections above those with real talent. There were too many Greengrasses for her name alone to mean something. Slughorn had already grilled her on her parents and close relatives. Since it was only the second day of school, Pandora didn't realize she was supposed to lie about that. Besides, if her parents weren't good enough for Slughorn, maybe he wasn't good enough for her. She wasn't cut out to work at the Ministry, or be some quidditch star anyway. Everything about the future was in turmoil due to He Who Must Not Be Named. Pandora was pureblood so she and her family would be fine, either way.

***********************************

James was left reeling after Prof. Dumbledore and Prof. McGonagall visited his home.

He honestly had not considered that Peter would be in trouble in his animagus form. If James had let anyone know that he could take the form of a rat when Peter went missing, there was a chance he could have been found before it was too late. A staff member had been told by a student about a cat catching a rat that same night.

That's when things turned very ugly. This was the second time that someone was in mortal danger, James had information, and neglected to say anything.

The school had also suspected Peter, and probably James, were responsible for after hours vandalism and endangering students. Students were almost gravely injured by a falling masonry close to where the rat was last seen. That occurred in December while on probation and after their suspension.

Lastly, and most hurtful, was when his parents, especially his mother, told some ridiculous tale about James being obsessed with another boy at the school, once Prof. McGonagall let them know that James had been following Snape since he returned from suspension. He had been following Evans with Snape, which then opened up the can of worms that this girl had been targeted multiple times by James and his friends with jinxes designed to expose a girl's bosom or knickers.

No one would listen to him. It was so unfair. James had never cast anything on Evans, and she was in danger from dark arts-loving Snape. It should be Snape getting chucked out of school.

Locked wandless in his bedroom, James stewed over his parents disappointment in him. What really got him steamed was how disappointed he was in them. They should have listened to him and defended their son.

He threw the mirror down and it cracked. Damn Sirius. James had been trying to contact him ever since Peter went missing.

**********************************

Lily was frustrated by their lack of finding something meaningful within Gryffindor tower. They had found a room, but it was no credit to her house. At some point in the past, quidditch players had rigged something that Pandora identified as a pair of very powerful omnioculars, trained out a window pointed at the pitch to record team practices.

Severus found recordings stored as recently as twelve years earlier, if the Gryffindors kept labeling them. There were a lot of of unmarked ones lying about.

When Prof. McGonagall looked at the room later that evening, she calmly called a house elf to clean it out. Her sense of fairness was injured, but she doubted the team had used this for the past decade. There had been some altercations over who the next quidditch captain should be a number of times so at some point the secret of this room had been lost.

***********************************

Sirius and Apolline had been so busy over the holidays, that Sirius did not get around to opening his greetings from England until after the first.

A glimmer of the old Sirius resurfaced when he read a letter from Prongs. Wormtail was dead? The clipping from the paper was so pathetic. So much like Peter himself. Short and unremarkable, but still a Marauder.

Wormtail had disappeared after curfew one night and no one could find him. He hadn't told James he was going anywhere and had packed nothing. Obviously, it was foul play. Hogwarts was pretty hard to break into, if one was not currently a student or staff member, so James' thought that it was someone inside was the best argument. Only one person in the castle would be stupid enough to mess with a Marauder – Snape.

What to do about it though? Sirius was banned from ever setting foot in England, or Scotland or anywhere the British Ministry of Magic held domain so he couldn't do anything directly. His brother and parents would not care about Peter. No one other than James, Remus and the Pettigrews would. Breaking Remus out of Azkaban would take too much time, and might be impossible. Besides, it was cold up there this time of year, and Apolline and Sirius were heading to southern Italy tomorrow.

He needed someone crazy who needed little or no excuse for committing acts of violence. Sirius knew of no one crazy enough to go pounding on the door of Hogwarts and demanding Snape's head … but he did have a cousin who rightly belonged locked up in St. Mungo's. Bella was an animal. Her husband and brother-in-law were also. The only thing they cared about was their moldy master. What did he care about, other than absolute power? Purebloods,mudbloods, muggles … Sirius knew a very horrible muggle, but to admit that he was … it's not like he would ever see Bella again, if he could help it. She'd believe her ickle little baby cousin was not as strong as her too.

He inked his quill and set to work putting things in motion to avenge Peter's death.

_Dear Bella, _

_I have had months to consider my greatest regret in not being able to return to England. Over the summer, my friends and I were having a bit of sport when some hostile muggles attacked us. I had considered that I would return to the pub where this crime against wizards occurred next summer to teach them a valuable lesson once I could apparate, but now I find that impossible and it has been weighing heavily on my mind that these muggles go unpunished …_

Sirius signed his name with a flourish, read over his letter with a smirk, and then folded and addressed it. He was about to start some other correspondence when a siren call came from the bath in french, "Oh Sirius darling, I need you assistance in here. There's a spot I just can't reach."

With his tongue hanging from his mouth, Sirius rushed to aid his lady.

***********************************

Lily's mother wrote that Petunia got engaged on Christmas. She did not recognize the name of the fellow, Vernon Dursley, but Lily did not know Tunie's new friends. Her first thought was her older sister might be rushing things since her mother said they only knew each other for a few months, but Lily did remember that getting married and being a homemaker were pretty much Petunia's life goals. How did she know this Vernon was the right one? She'd be moving to southern England, after they married, because he lived and worked there. How did they even meet?

A spring wedding would be too much of a rush, so they were trying to reserve the church for summer, and Lily's mother wanted to know if Lily could come home for a week, if school was not out yet. With apparating, it should not be a problem, but Lily made a point of checking with Prof. McGonagall so she could let her mother know as soon as possible.

Severus handed her a small sack before she had a chance to say anything. She heard the sound of glass clinking, as he said, "Morning. Slytherin has these in a big wooden cabinet in the girls' bath. I took enough for the rest of the year, and then each of one of the others since I didn't know what else you'd want."

"You went in the girls' bath?"

"I knew Greengrass wasn't in there," he said with a disgusted look at her. "I looked up anything with an odd name, and it's on a slip of parchment with them."

"I'll look around the Gryffindor one more closely. It might be there all this time, and I might have thought it was for spare towels."

"Alright. I won't be able to go back in there, once school's in session. If you want more, you'll have to let me know soon."

"Oh, Petunia got engaged."

Severus nodded and replied, "That's nice."

"You think so?"

He shrugged, "Doesn't she want to be married? You two played house a lot, and … it was Tunie that wanted to play that, wasn't it?"

Lily laughed. "I remember the time I tried to let you play and handed you a doll. Tunie ripped it out of your arms."

"Yes, because I wasn't holding it right," Severus replied with a smirk.

"You weren't."

"It was a doll."

"House was a serious game to Tunie for a long time. Though by the time you came along, I guess we were getting tired of it."

"I watched you two play it before at the playground. I didn't know you were a witch then. I thought you were both a little odd strapping one into the baby swing."

"As I said, we took it very seriously."

"Did you ever make one of those fly for Tunie?"

"No, or at least I don't think so. We treated our dolls well."

"They had their hair, all their limbs and eyes."

"So?"

"I've seen a little girls playing with dirty, plastic torsos so your dolls were very impressive, especially in those nice doll clothes." The Evans' girls were interesting for their good clothes and their nice toys. Severus was not too interested in their things, but would wonder about how they lived differently.

"We were allowed to wash and help press them. Tunie got a little carried away with starching some of their things. It got all crackly under the iron, but I liked the way that smelled."

Severus mused, "Starch? That's real stuff not just describing something stiff?"

"Yeah, it's how muggles stiffen clothing that's supposed to be crisp, or sometimes they'll use it on fancy tableclothes and napkins. It depends. Not as many people use it anymore. I don't know why. It comes in a spray now so it's so easy to use."

"Wouldn't it be more work?"

"It's part of ironing your clothes anyway. Just spray it on, and press it."

"It may sound simple to you, Lily, but not to me. Your mother makes it look easy." Ironed clothes? He saw Lily's mother do the task so it was not hard, just very repetitive. She ironed a lot of things for her family. Her whole life revolved around taking care of them.

Lily nodded, while thinking about asking about Sev's mother, but then thought better of it. She wasn't sure what his mother did, and it was possible she did absolutely nothing at all. Lily had never seen Severus wear anything that could be ironed, other than his school uniform.

"So, any details about Petunia, or she's simply engaged?"

"I don't know him. He's not even from around us. Mum's hoping they'll marry this year."

"Any reason for her to hope that?"

"What do you mean?"

He sighed and replied, "Anything. Perhaps your parents don't want to let such a fine fellow get away?" Lily wouldn't think it funny for him to ask if her sister was pregnant.

"It probably because Petunia is going to drive them crazy with planning everything. Why let it get out of hand with it taking years to arrange?"

"Years?"

"Sure. Some people are engaged for years before getting married."

"Why?"

"To arrange things."

"What is there that takes that long to arrange? It sounds like they are putting it off. Perhaps hedging their bets for someone better to come along."

"No, they're not. It takes time to plan a big, proper wedding, and to plan where to live, and to set things up."

"I don't understand. It sounds like they are putting off something that should be important to them."

"I know what you're trying to say, Sev, but it's not that way for everyone."

"What way is it for you, Lily?"

"Um, I don't know. I have a few wizarding friends, and then my parents and Petunia are muggles, and I guess her fiancé too so uh … I don't have many people to invite. Oh, your parents? Sorry."

He snorted, "Sorry they're my parents?"

"No, silly. I was nattering on about me, and wasn't thinking about you."

"That's alright. I asked you what you wanted. That means I expected you to talk about you, Lily."

"Oh … um, what do you think they'll think? Your parents, I mean."

"About us? My mother already knows you."

"That wasn't much of an introduction, Sev."

"No, not this past summer. I told her about you before. When I first met you."

"You did?"

"Yes, because she said I would meet you. She said it would be when I went to Hogwarts and made a lot of friends, but I found you before that."

"Alright," Lily agreed, not sure if Sev was making fun of her or his mother. Sev had a lot of friends at Hogwarts? It was probably something she told him to get him excited about coming here. Lily remembered when Sev used to talk about Hogwarts all the time, and what great times they'd have here. Magic was great. Severus was great. But Lily found a lot at the school to be lacking greatness. "Um, with Petunia being the focus of my parents' attention, maybe I'll wait to tell them about us? I don't want Petunia throwing a fit."

"Us?" repeated Severus, not sure if Lily was saying something definite about them.

"Well, you know … they already know we're friends, but not that we're um, seeing each other."

"Oh." Yeah, that's exactly what he should have thought Lily meant. Nothing.

***********************************

Potter was expelled. Well, wasn't that a kick in the pants. Regulus pondered this new development. He had been tickled pink when his brother was chucked out of both school and the country. Lupin and Pettigrew's removal were notable only because they were his brother's cronies, but they weren't anything special, except to shut Pettigrew's guffawing mouth once and for all. But Sirius' best friend, who would assist his older brother in tormenting him? Good that he was gone, but now Regulus had no Marauders to be in the vicinity when he cast a jinx.

Thankfully, his pal, Barty, was an absolute genius. Of course the Marauders would have taught their only good spells to younger Gryffindor lads. Not too young, but the fifth years were definitely candidates.

***********************************

Their remaining days became routine with breakfast, library for about an hour, and then investigating another section of the castle. They found rooms, cupboards, closets, shortcuts and other passages, but never got lost or made a huge discovery. Towards the end, Lily found it rather dull. Sev and her now had several shag places, and he had cast a detection spell on all the ones they liked to find out if others used them, once school was back in session.

They also made use of that classroom a few times for fun since Lily was getting so forgetful and forgot to either wear knickers, or kept having a recurring dream about going to class naked and being called to the front of the room by Prof. Snape. Prof. Evans did not go so well since Severus did not enjoy being undressed, and the normalcy of the situation, other than being naked, rendered him unresponsive.

Lily noted that his pockmarks were deeper and more numerous all over his body. Her green tinge was also lighter. They were both normally pale, but Sev's skin was not the same pale prone to burning and freckles that went with Lily's ginger hair.

He was also making a conscious effort to eat more for Lily, both because she was watching him during every meal and he had been feeling physically tired lately. Sev suspected it was the shagging since that required a level of physical activity he was unaccustomed to. Lily, on the other hand, was feeling energized, but was agreeable to more holding, hugging and snogging, rather than expecting him to do it repeatedly for hours.

At Lily's insistence, he ate a bit of cake without icing for his birthday at lunch, since the rest of the students would be returning later in the day. Spice cake was not particularly loathsome, though he'd rather not eat it.

It was not really a party, but Greengrass did wait until it concluded to thank them for their company with hints that they were no longer to act like they knew her. Severus understood, and explained it to Lily afterwards. Pandora had six more years, and five of them would be without Lily present as her champion when the mood struck her.

She wasn't happy about Pandora, nor that she allowed Severus to choose what they did for his birthday. He had his arms around her and they were both fully clothed. They kissed, held hands and he looked in her eyes frequently. When Lily could not take it any more, she suggested that this was a great shagging opportunity that he was letting go to waste.

With a sigh, he replied, "Alright." Lily was not encouraged by it, but suddenly there was a glow in Sev's eyes as he stared into hers as he unbuttoned her clothing. She let him continue without interruption since it was his birthday. It was nice. It was slow. It was satisfying. Making love?

It was different than the shagging that Lily normally enjoyed because Sev positioned her so she could hardly move. She sat, while he stood with her legs hooked over his elbows, and it was all Severus. The thing that made it so special was he never took his eyes off hers, unless she was throwing her head back to howl, or she was looking down between them to see it sliding in and out of her, glistening, wet, hard and so powerful. It was mesmerizing.

***********************************

Lily spent the evening with Mary in their room. Mary was not happy about Severus not naming the raven. Not happy at all, especially when Lily talked about what a burden it was to him. There were no windows in Slytherin to let it out so he built it a nest in the rafters of the clock tower since ravens did not get along with owls. Severus was worried about being seen with it because someone who disliked him might take it out on the poor animal. Although Lily should feel badly about getting Mary upset, she didn't. She was a … dunderhead for making a gift like that.

They talked over the rumor that Potter was expelled. It was probably started by Potter or one of his adoring fans so he could make a grand entrance. Lily doubted that Potter could get himself expelled, even if he set Dumbledore's robe on fire while declaring he was doing it on purpose.

***********************************

After breakfast, Lily crossed the Great Hall towards Severus to go to class together. Rather than letting her near the Slytherin table, he rose to meet her at the doors.

When they left, Severus was looking around, rather than paying attention to her. Without warning, he loudly growled, "Greengrass, I want a word with you." The young girls with Pandora momentarily went owl-eyed, before adopting the universal Slytherin look for being unconcerned and bored.

"What?" she snarled at him.

"Without them."

Lily tugged at his sleeve, "What did she do, Sev? She's only a first year."

"_Muffliato."_

To both of them, he said, "Mulciber's most upset over the staff discovering the Slytherin quidditch strategy room. I'm upset that he'll be in Slytherin more."

"The Slytherin …?" Lily started to ask.

"I think it was facing the pitch, Lily."

"Oh!"

"Darned McGonagall," he said with a smirk.

"Oh yes, that darned McGonagall," Pandora agreed.

***********************************

Getting in her morning shag with Sev did nothing to calm Lily's nerves over apparition class. Their first lesson in the Great Hall. Were they going to take them somewhere where they could apparate, or was today only a lecture on what they needed to do?

The rest of the sixth years congregated. It was odd that it was just her and Mary representing Gryffindor. If there was something to be brave about, they could probably take on all the other houses. Mary had tried to reassure her that everybody eventually learned to apparate, but a lot of wizards and witches didn't like it. Flooing was nicer, since it was considered bad manners to apparate directly into another person's house or even a store.

Severus joined the two of them. Mary had cooled a little on Sev, but had not given up on him yet. Lily had told her that they kissed without mistletoe, but Mary sort of blew that off with an offhand comment that of course he'd try it with someone eventually. Then she had said something like seventeen year old boys who never kissed were losers, and Severus was not a loser. Lily had considered arguing that she hadn't called Sev anything, loser or otherwise, but it wasn't worth it.

Professors Sprout and Flitwick arrived with an unimpressive, short witch with a drab light beige robe and matching pointed hat. Her hair was almost the same color.

Severus muttered, "I doubt her and Dumbledore shop at the same establishments."

"Oh come on, Sev. She's got to dress for … work. The Ministry might be different with its dress code."

"Yeah, a lot of grey robes at the Minsitry," Mary agreed.

The professors called for quiet, and the witch spoke in a quiet voice after she amplified it with her wand. "Good morning," said the Ministry witch. "My name is Winifred Twycross and I shall be your Ministry Apparition instructor for the next twelve weeks. After which, you shall all be qualified and hopefully prepared to take your Apparition Tests."

Lily made a face. Severus' moaning about this being a mandatory course was apparently true. Still, how else were they going to learn to apparate in a school where people could not apparate?

"As all of you know, it is usually impossible to Apparate or Disapparate at Hogwarts. The headmaster has been kind enough to lift this enchantment, within the Great Hall for one hour only. I would like to emphasize you will not be able to Apparate outside the walls of this Hall.

"I would like each of you to place yourselves so that you have a clear five feet of space in front of you."

Lily was startled. Were they going to do something now, or were they going to do some sort of warm-up exercise?

Mary, Lily and Severus had no problem following the instruction to space themselves, but from the hold-up in the rest of the Hall, it appeared not everyone was as astute because both Professors Sprout and Flitwick had to assist them.

The witch waved her wand and wooden hoops instantly appeared on the floor in front of every student. "The important thing to remember when Apparating are the three D's! Destination, Determination and Deliberation!

"Step one: Fix your mind firmly upon the desired _destination_. All of you should now be focusing on the interior of your hoop. Please do that now."

The witch paused to allow them to concentrate, but Lily noticed she was not the only one sneaking a look at what other students were doing. Sev's eyes met hers, but she turned away first. If she didn't do it as soon as him, he'd point out that she was not looking at her hoop when she should have.

"Step two: Focus your _determination_ to occupy the visualized space! Let your yearning to enter it flood from your mind to every part of your body!"

Lily concentrated but yearning to occupy a space was different than yearning to do other things.

"Step three: Wait till I give the command … and only then. Turn on the spot, feeling your way into nothingness, moving with _determination_! On my command, now … one … two … THREE!"

Lily spun but went nowhere. While spinning, she saw that Mary tipped over. Ha!

Maybe the laugh was on her though because Severus was in his wooden hoop, looking unimpressed with his arms crossed over his chest. Neither Lily nor Severus realized he was the only one to accomplish it because when he muttered, "What a fucking waste of twelve galleons," many overheard it due to Snape becoming the focus of attention.

"Five points from Slytherin, Mr. Snape," Professor Sprout intoned.

"Never mind," said Twycross dryly, continuing the lesson. In fact, she taught this course so many years, she no longer paid attention to the students and did not realize one had apparated without the screams of splinching. "Adjust your hoops, please, and back to your original positions."

Prof. McGonagall emerged from the door that would normally be behind the Head Table, and she looked thunderous. How dare Horace suggest he had better things to do this morning. He had talked himself into supervising the evening detentions, and he had students at the apparition lesson. For him to suggest to Albus that she pick up the slack because Minerva only had two students at the appartition lesson … well, they were both straight on that now, or else she'd go back in there and sort them again.

It had already begun without them. She nodded at Filius and Pomona, and calmed herself with a deep breath.

On the next attempt, only one student got to his hoop. Severus Snape. No one was splinched. Minerva did not like that. The screaming was unbearable.

Pomona approached her, "Alright, Minerva?"

"Fine. Horace's … never mind."

"Hmm. I know. Mr. Snape apparated on the first attempt. I had to take a few points due to his language, but if Horace were here maybe he could have made them up."

"I doubt it. Horace does not like Severus."

"He's a good boy, but you're right, he's not the sort of material Horace looks for."

"Hard workers, you mean? Even Argus has said positive things about him."

"Merlin," Pomona said with a titter. "No, I meant um, I don't know, not prettier, but he lacks something …"

"Charisma?"

"Maybe."

Lily had watched Severus on the second attempt. He hardly spun, and it didn't look like he was concentrating. She had seen more serious looks on his face while he gazed at her breasts than the way he was looking at that damned hoop.

"What are you doing?" she hissed at him, when they set up for a third try.

"Forgetting that my destination is a hoop five feet away, and believing that's where I want to be."

"That's not very helpful, Sev."

He shrugged at her, and this time apparated close to the Hogwarts' teachers, rather than his hoop. Severus asked, "Do I need to stay for the rest of this?"

"Maybe a few more tries to make sure you have it down," suggested Filius.

"You wouldn't want to splinch at the wrong time later," Pomona recommended. "We're here to sort it out now."

Prof. Slughorn joined them, after protesting his very solid case to Albus, once Minerva was gone. "What are you doing here, Snape? You'll never learn it unless you join the others. Now stop wasting our time."

The laughter from both teachers and students as Snape gave Slughorn the finger, clued Horace in that something was amiss, but when he turned back to see if Snape was on the move back to his position, he found him standing there, arms down. "What are you waiting for?"

"I was doublechecking that I hadn't splinched anything, sir."

"Can't get splinched until you try, Snape."

He drawled, "Right," and walked back to his spot so slowly, he missed the fourth apparition attempt.

On the fifth try, Snape, Wilkes, and a Ravenclaw ended up in their hoops, and a Hufflepuff was screaming because she was splinched. It was a nasty one, with one vertical half of her still at her original spot.

Not moving from her position to assist the splinched student, the Ministry witch dispassionately instructed them, "Splinching, or the separation of random body parts occurs when the mind is insufficiently _determined_. You must concentrate continuously upon your _destination_, and move, without haste, but with _deliberation_ … thus."

She stepped forward, turned in a full circle on the spot with her arms completely outstretched, and vanished, reappearing at the other end of the Hall, not realizing that three students had successfully completed the task. "Remember the three D's, and try again … one – two – three -"

Lily was not reassured when Severus mentioned that if it was a hula hoop contest, Lily would have beaten all of them. Well, it was worth a giggle. She knew Sev couldn't hula hoop worth a crap. Even her mum got it to twirl around a couple times.

***********************************

AN: Despite thoughts to the contrary, all those rat skeletons down in the basilisk lair came from somewhere. Perhaps the magic was to redirect warm-blooded vermin like mice and rats below to feed the monster, which made the rest of the castle appear to be free of pests.

AN: James' letter to Sirius was written prior to James finding out that Peter was killed as a rat. Sirius did not read it till later.


	36. Chapter 36 Important to Some, Worthless

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 36 Important to Some, Worthless to Others

Homework was killing Lily. She hardly had time to shag Sev, and they only did it a couple mornings a week with extra, lots extra, for her birthday.

She had gotten back on the prefect patrol schedule, but Lily took that seriously and did not bother Sev while he had detention. She may look at him briefly, but would keep going because Mr. Filch was no longer watching other students.

She was steadily apparating in lessons by the third week. It took her a bit to digest what Severus was saying. It was not a hoop only five feet away, or at least that's what finally got it working.

Now that it appeared Potter really was expelled, Lily had thought about requesting readmittance to Magical Creatures, but did not want to appear wishy-washy. It would also be a lot of reading to catch up on. Perhaps before Easter break, or maybe before the summer, she'd speak to Prof. Kettleburn.

The weather also turned bitterly cold and even the snow got painfully icy. As long as she walked with Severus to Herbology, he had an arsenal of spells to keep them somewhat warmer and drier. Lily was not completely sure they were standard spells since he cast many things nonverbally. He also accepted extra credit from Prof. Sprout to take a turn early in the morning to keep the temperature properly set in the greenhouses. When Lily tried to talk him out of it, Severus said he could spend the time with the raven since he was not getting to the clock tower as often as he liked during the week. With the cold, she also was in the school more, hiding deeper in the clock tower and also entering the main stairwell through adjoining halls while class was in session.

It was due to that situation, that the students found out that Severus had a familiar. Lily and Sev were on their way to Transfiguration after breakfast. Without their heroes, the little Gryffs stopped calling Severus anything, or at least when Lily was around. They were still imitating their juvenile protectors by giving other boys, usually younger, wedgies, and hassling them in the gents'. There was also a couple that continued the fine tradition of attacking the female students' blouses, skirts and robes. Lily silently quoted a modern philosopher in her mind, every time she heard of that happening - "Fucking Gryffindors". Her language had taken a definite downturn that her parents would not approve of.

So Lily was alert in the stairwell as they climbed it, although nothing had been cast at her since Black and Pettigrew attacked her outside months ago. An alarmed scream started from high above and got quickly louder. She looked up and saw groups of heads also leaning out and turned upwards. Lily squinted, Peeves was dropping down the center of the stairs, or was until he veered around a couple then continued his descent. Couldn't he go through them?

Next to her, Severus took his wand out. He felt the panic within him … but it wasn't his. Peeves was chasing his raven, even though it was hard to see her nor did he ever hear her make that sound before. He had been meaning to try some spells on the poltergeist, based on some reading he had done. However, molesting the school's fixture would definitely get him into trouble, unless Severus had a very good reason. He was sure Mr. Filch would be game for anything he cast at the menace, but Peeves would not stay quiet about it.

She dove towards her person. The bird felt his confidence that this tormentor of hers would be simple to deal with once it got close enough to him.

Students screamed as they realized it wasn't Peeves alone, but he was chasing something black and … unknown. Lily screamed because she realized it was Sev's raven, but it was diving right at them without slowing. She had a sharp beak and claws.

Severus was casting a spell that should solidify a being such as Peeves, making him heavier, unable to pass through objects and generally make him clumsy and more importantly, unable to escape as easily by simply disappearing.

The raven zoomed beneath the staircase her person was on, looped beneath it to brake her speed and ascend to join her person in her revenge.

So intent was he on his prey, that Peeves forgot there were some spells that could impede him. No one ever bothered to use them on him. He continued his plummeting descent because there was only so far down the little birdie could go, she'd get tired beating her little feathered wings, and then he'd make the little birdie sing. Whoops! Staircase directly below and there was a jerk of his body in the wrong direction and Splat!

As the poltergeist got closer and swerved to miss hitting a staircase, Severus gave his wand a jerk and pulled it back so Peeves collided with it face first. Perhaps it was a property of a poltergeist, he thought as he tilted his head to study how Peeves slid along in a flattened version of himself till he reach the end, fell off with an audible 'plop' and landed about eight feet away on the staircase he and Lily were on.

The raven on his left shoulder did a very good imitation of mocking laughter. She probably heard plenty of it during her short stay within the stairwell. Hogwarts students were notorious for it.

Since he had already assaulted the poltergeist, Severus decided to test something else. With a cutting motion of his wand, he was pleased to find he could sever a part of it and summoned it to him, with Peeves' usual cry of "Got your conk."

Peeves flailed momentarily and then covered the middle of his face with his hands, claiming "That's dirty quidditch, mate."

Severus handed the unreal nose upwards to the bird, who took it in her beak. After a moment of tightening on the thing, she expelled it in an arc that sent it sailing out of view beneath the stairs. She did a reasonable cry of disgust with "Bleh!"

Lily was surprised when Severus said, "Let's get to class." But what about …? And how did he …? Of course, the three of them, including the raven, arrived in time not to be late, but with no time for Lily to question him without earning Prof. McGonagall's ire.

***********************************

Those were questions on a lot of other students' minds too, and many of them thought they knew all about Severus Snape, or at least the bulk of Gryffindor thought they did. He was a slimy Slytherin death eater that loved the Dark Arts, and now he had some demon familiar that had assumed the shape of a raven. Obviously Peeves could see it for what it truly was, and didn't like the idea of something more malevolent than him in the school. If only the Marauders were still around to protect them!

The Ravenclaws thought Snape made clever use of a little known spell as they researched what he could have used in the library. On the raven, well, ravens were very clever and desirable as familiars. Everyone knew that.

The Hufflepuffs were pleased that someone took a stand against Peeves molesting a defenseless animal. Until Snape did something, that poor bird was running for its very life, and no one was helping it, even though it was calling out for assistance.

Slytherins were not impressed. Actually, they were quite bored. If that was intended to be some sort of entertainment, it had failed miserably. Some quietly were concerned that this was another area that the miserable halfblood had been underestimated in. Could he only do this with poltergeists or could he influence ghosts, and possibly get them to do his bidding? They were so taken aback because they had not even realized Snape had a familiar, unless this bird somehow got into the castle in search of a new and powerful master. There were tales about such things like the most recent one of Dumbledore and his phoenix, but until now, none of them ever saw it happen.

Minerva immediately granted an exemption for one particular raven allowed in the school as a familiar, when Horace suddenly remembered the rule of cats, owls and toads only, despite him allowing other Slytherins a snake and tarantulas. There was another raven over in Ravenclaw, and Hufflepuff house had a variety of animals, including a snail.

She was willing to follow Horace to the headmaster since the staff knew of Mr. Snape's raven since break. It was not a menace, and obviously could not have prevented all students from getting to class since Mr. Snape, Miss Evans, the raven and her entire first period Transfiguration class were on time this morning. Horace had better learn to cut his losses and move on. He was acting like a child when it came to Mr. Snape, and Minerva did not believe for one single second that Miss Evans' association with him was ruining her chances at greatness. If Horace turned his pettiness on one of her Gryffindors, he'd have to answer to her. He was already supervising evening detentions, if Horace wanted to keep playing this game, she'd make sure he was the loser. He may have been playing it longer, but she could play it smarter.

All students, even Slytherins, were deeply troubled because Mr. Filch was smiling. Really smiling. They were all doomed.

***********************************

Lucius was very interested in Narcissa Black becoming his future wife. She wasn't like her sister, Bellatrix, in the slightest. However, he did find himself in the company of Bellatrix, her husband, Rodolphus, and his crazy-eyed brother, Rabastan. The five of them were going out to have a little fun. It seemed harmless enough, and Lucius was interested in the Dark Lord, however some things troubled him. What were the real plans and who was going to be given power? Lucius was a Malfoy, and already wielded a great deal of respect and power. He was interested in some of the proposed changes and improvements, but not at the expense of the power he already had, his social standing or wealth.

He agreed that muggles were little better than animals. House elves and giants were also capable of speech, but they weren't people. The Ministry had bungled an investigation involving an attack on young wizards by some hostile muggles so it seemed only right that a lesson be taught. Can't have the sheep thinking they run the farm.

***********************************

Lily was really getting ticked. Mary was singing to herself, and absolutely delighted over her bird, or the bird she had given Severus. In fact, Mary was trying to pay Lily back ten times over for calling her gift stupid, and would continue humming, singing and making inane comments about how clever, helpful and beautiful that raven was, peppered in with complimentary comments about Severus being clever too.

Severus was not in a good mood either. He now had to keep the bird with him to protect it from either Peeves or students. A cage in his dormitory would not protect it from jinxes or hexes so he'd also have to let it stay in the confines of his bed overnight so those protections would be extended to it or more correctly, her. His bed was not up against a wall since he preferred the option of being able to escape through either side so he constructed a roomy shelf to hang from the canopy support, over his feet, not his head, and then gave it some shallow sides to keep the nesting materials up there instead of raining down on him when she moved. He also added another shelf for water and food. This was such a bother. Severus never asked for a familiar in the first place, but had to do all these things for it. He wouldn't mind doing things for Lily, but this was a bird.

He brought the thing with him to detention and Mr. Filch was looking too pleased. It made him look rather mad. Severus knew he hated Peeves, but Peeves was still in the school and technically unharmed. He did not even feel any pain when Severus crashed him into the stone stairs nor when he sliced off his nose. And if Peeves felt any sort of pride, he would not dress the way he did. Unless he had some bizarre competition going on with Dumbledore.

Mrs. Norris was sitting quite primly on his desk with her tail wrapped around her paws and was gazing at the bird on his shoulder. There was a wrapped gift next to her.

Filch's voice was a bit high as he said, "Mrs. Norris wanted to give your young miss a welcoming gift. She'll be a great asset to you, Snape."

Severus looked more closely at the cat. If she was after the bird, her tail would be twitching. He knew that much after watching Mrs. Norris on the prowl. It would be stranger if Mr. Filch was trying to give him a gift so … he decided to reply, "Thank you. Mrs. Norris and Mr. Filch."

He opened the box and it was lined with wax paper to keep the contents from leaking through. It was shiny meat stuff. His raven recognized it as delectable entrails, and enjoyed her feast while Filch and his cat looked on in approval.

"Has she got a name yet?"

"No, I've thought of a couple, but no one seems to like them."

"Is she smart, or smarter than other birds?"

"She can count."

"Maybe something that starts with Professor," Filch suggested. "A title's not appropriate for all familiars, but for some of them it suits."

Since his name used the same letters for both first and last, Severus thought of mathematical terms beginning with 'p'. None of them sounded feminine of even applicable – polygon, percent, pentagon, positive, permutation, power, proportion, parabola, and Pythagoras was male. pi? She wasn't particularly circular, but it was a very pure mathematical concept. phi? It began with the letter "p" but not the sound. The golden ratio was similar to pi in its simplicity and purity, but did not get people thinking about circles. Maybe drop the professor bit, and just call her phi? He'd have to ask Lily. She would find some reason why it was no good. If he did not mention it was a Greek letter that meant something mathematical, it might stand a slightly better chance.

Severus left with his raven after he was told where to perform maintenance. Lately, Mr. Filch would only give him some general directions and allowed him to do other things, if he saw anything out of place in that vicinity. Severus did tell him what he did before returning to Slytherin, in case he needed to undo anything. He had done it a little in December, but his main goal now was working on weather-proofing the school to prevent drafts. The terrible weather outside made it rather simple to find them, without even casting a detection spell. Severus was also updating his maps because some of the drafts were coming mysteriously from the center walls, rather than outer walls.

While he worked, Severus had plenty of time for thinking of other things. Easter fell on April 10th this year. It was questionable whether Lily and him were taking their apparition test before or after the school holiday. This instructor did not feel it was important, when many of the students turned seventeen prior to that date, and had a keen interest in scheduling for the earliest possible test date. Severus and Lily were not the only ones with a long train ride home, or possible plans to apparate elsewhere.

With Petunia's wedding happening sometime close after that, he expected Lily would want to go home for at least part of the week off. She said something about needing to be fit for some gown, muggle-style. It would look odd if Lily just accepted any size, and then had it fit perfect when she fixed it. Severus only felt that would be a problem if the person they bought the dress from went to the wedding.

Severus had gotten far in this corridor when Lily found him. Since he did not know where he'd be working till Mr. Filch told him, it was up to Lily to discover where he was. She liked it.

"I found you, Sev."

"I had no doubts, Lily."

"You brought her here too?" she asked, indicating his raven, that was perched on some molding jutting out of the stone wall.

"Yes. What do you think of the name phi for her?"

"Fi? Or do you mean Fi like short for Fiona?"

"phi," he repeated.

"Like what the giant said? Fee Fi Fo Fum? I smell the blood of an Englishman, be he alive or be he dead, I'll have his bones to grind my bread?"

"I didn't know giants were that articulate."

"The one in Jack and the Beanstalk was. Jack stole his golden goose so he had good reason to grind him up."

"You like phi then?"

"What's it mean?"

"Hmm?"

"You did not pick it randomly, Sev. What is it?"

"Well, Mr. Filch suggested I give her a name that started with Professor since she can count, but I couldn't think of anything that went well with that title and expressed something mathematical other than pi. However since pi is a numerical ratio for circles and curves, I did not think there was anything circular about the bird."

"She doesn't look like a professor."

"Anyway, I did think of the other numerical ratio, phi." Using his wand, Severus drew **φ ** in a golden script.

"Huh?"

"The sectio divina is a plus b is to a as a is to b. Or represented by phi, the lower case Greek letter."

Ignoring the Greek whatever, Lily asked, "So just Phi?"

"Yes, if that's alright."

Lily blinked. It was a really bizarre thing that was totally Severus, and Mary would hate it. A lower case Greek letter that meant some barmy math thing. Based on that logic, Lily agreed, "She looks like a Phi."

***********************************

Crazy Muggles! That's what Lucius had been thinking for the past hour. He and Narcissa had escaped, after she had summoned his wand, and then they apparated and limped into Malfoy Manor from outside the apparition barrier.

His hand may be alright, but his right arm was broken. Looking in the mirror, Lucius confirmed what his tongue previously told him. Two teeth were missing. Narcissa had a black eye and a jagged cut from a broken bottle that was slashed across her face by one of those animals.

It had been an absolute disaster. Bellatrix and her two relatives by marriage wanted to strike terror in the hearts of that foul bunch of muggles in that smoke-filled, reeking lair of theirs. The ignorant fools thought someone supporting a rival sports team had conjured the Dark Mark above their pub. They were so simple-minded, they did not consider how it got there.

Their anger at not being recognized got the better of them, and Bella hit the fellow that was serving drinks at the bar with a killing curse. Rather than running for the exits, that Lucius and Narcissa had blocked, the muggles rushed Bella and the wizards, and clear as day, Lucius heard one of the men yell, "Get those sticks out of their hands, even if you have to rip their arms off!" There were more flashes of green, but the Lestranges disappeared.

Lucius was unable to look for them. Although he thought he was not acting suspiciously and was not standing with the Lestanges, some of the patrons chose to attack him. Narcissa was injured when she objected, rather than escaping on her own and leaving Lucius behind.

***********************************

Lily was right. Mary did not like Phi's name one bit. Of course, Mary did not say it to Severus' face, but was sweet as pie. She was so false to him, it made Lily mad.

Severus even took to not directly addressing Mary, but she ignored that. Her fire for him had somehow been rekindled. Lily felt she was a complete nincompoop. She was wasting her time when there were plenty of other fellows at the school for her to try to attach herself to. Mary already insisted that the three of them would have a lovely time in Hogsmeade next weekend for Valentine's Day.

Although Lily was not sure what her and Severus planned to do for Valentine's Day, it would not involve Mary MacDonald.

***********************************

There was not a peep in The Daily Prophet, unless one counted the obituaries of the Lestrange brothers. That's what clued in Magical Law Enforcement and sent them looking for what happened to two suspected top Death Eaters.

They did not need to go far since the local muggle newspaper had a photo of the Dark Mark on the front page. It merely took them a couple days to find it, and then get their muggle savvy members over to claim the bodies of these 'internationally wanted criminals', and gather what information they could from the local authorities.

Prior to that, Lord Voldemort summoned Bellatrix to find out why he was reading about the death of two of his Death Eaters in the newspaper, once another of his loyal followers brought it to his attention.

She prostrated herself immediately, twinged in pain, and murmured, "My Lord."

"Bellatrix, widowed at such a young age. Such a pity. Throwing yourself so completely into mourning that you had forgotten about me?"

"Never, my Lord."

He frowned. The Lestrange brothers were the sons of one of his earliest minions that he had recruited while still a student at Hogwarts. Their loss would be keenly felt, if he possessed such sentimentality, but their efforts and hard work would definitely create a hole in his organization.

"Were you with them?"

"Yes, my Lord. They were already dead when I fled."

"Fled?"

"I … I was grossly outnumbered, my Lord. The information given to us was extremely poor."

"Did I supply you with such poor information?"

"No, my Lord."

"Were you even acting on my instructions?"

"No, my Lord."

"What is your greatest priority, Bellatrix?"

"You, my Lord."

"Exactly, and the three of you forgot that. _Crucio._"

***********************************

Albus was in London visiting members of the Ministry when Barty Crouch cornered him. "Dumbledore, what haven't you told me about that boy?"

"What boy?"

"Snape. Are you having some laugh at my expense?"

"No, of course not, Barty."

"Come with me. I have copies of the paper in my office."

"Paper?"

"Yes, the muggle newspaper. Muggles. Killing Death Eaters. You did hear the Lestrange brothers are dead?"

"Well, yes, but no details."

"Details? We needed to find out from the muggles. It was the middle of nowhere. But it wasn't nowhere, was it, Dumbledore?"

"It wasn't?" Albus asked, mildly concerned about his friend's confusion over his part or knowledge of the Lestranges.

"No, it's the same place those foul little urchins attacked muggles over the summer. Only this time it was their big Death Eater friends. We've already hauled in the Potter boy for questioning, and are still hunting down Bellatrix Lestrange. She's a slippery one. She'll claim she was nowhere around there, but there were eyewitnesses. Certainly sounds like her. And her sister with a long-haired blonde man. We've questioned both Narcissa Black and her good friend, Lucius Malfoy, but their alibis check out. Along with their solicitors."

"James Potter?" asked Albus in surprise.

"Of course, Dumbledore. He attacked muggles at this same pub less than a year ago."

"That pub? I've been there myself."

"Really?"

"Yes, Barty, I was tracking down a student's parent."

"Snape?"

"Exactly."

"Ah, here we are," Barty said as they entered his office, and he opened a cabinet drawer. His desk was clean with everything arranged precisely upon it. Even his quills were laid out in soldier-like precision.

"This paper had the cover story, but it wasn't till I took a look at the rest of the paper this morning that I put it together. Snape."

Albus adjusted his glasses on his nose to study the photo on the front page. The Dark Mark on a local muggle newspaper. He read the article. Five persons entered the pub and immediately killed the owner with an unidentified weapon. Albus frowned, that was a very nice man. He doubted he did anything offensive to provoke the Lestranges. The attackers continued killing those in the pub until they were forced to flee, or were thoroughly subdued by the patrons, mostly war veterans. The black-haired woman killed the two unconscious men, rather than allow them to be taken alive. That sounded rather odd to Albus. Why would Bellatrix kill her husband and brother-in-law? The sketch they included of her on the second page could certainly be Mrs. Lestrange.

Impatient that Dumbledore get to the reason he called him in here, Barty had folded a second copy of the paper, and thrust it at his friend, once he finished reading the article regarding the attack.

Albus took it, allowing Barty to take the other copy from him. Tobias Snape's obituary, but … wasn't Severus still at school? The photo was old since it was of a younger man with the same short hair style, completely dark colored in this monochrome photograph. He had been distinguished in his service to his country in the muggle war with Germany. A Royal Marine Commando sounded rather dangerous to Albus, but although names could be misleading, there was a long list of awards and medals, along with information about his service. Nothing about afterwards.

He turned the newspaper. Other fellows that died at the pub also had military service. Distinguished as well. Perhaps Eileen Snape was waiting until arrangements were made to send for Severus to come home? Albus looked at the date of the newspaper, four days ago, and it happened the evening before. Was that long for a muggle or did they have some sort of laying out ceremony for viewing the deceased? Shouldn't his son be there for that? Maybe Severus was gone, and Horace forgot to mention it. That was probably the case. Albus had been in London since yesterday, and did not see Horace since dinner … the night before last? With no story in the wizarding newspaper, Horace would have no idea that a death in a student's family was anything important, other than to the student.

***********************************

Lily was making faces at her porridge because it was a non-shagging morning. If Sev had a lot of homework left over, he told her the evening before in the library. She understood since he was still in detention too, and he said he needed to get more than a couple hours sleep each night now. They always had a standing appointment on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday morning each week so she was getting her … void filled regular. Ditching Mary on Valentine's Day was going to be a necessity, even if she had to tell Mary they were … doing more than kissing. Lily almost wished it was going to be a werewolf day for Mary.

She received a very large, flat envelope from home and her copy of The Prophet. After she scanned the front page of the paper, she opened the envelope. Her parents mailed her an entire copy of a newspaper. Lily saw why immediately – the Dark Mark was on the front page of her local muggle paper. They attacked the same pub Black and Potter did last summer? If wizards hated Manchester United, why weren't they over in Manchester?

Her mother's letter was short. Severus could have this copy, they bought extra and … Lily opened the paper to the page her mother listed. Uh, Sev's father? But why were all these muggles killed? What did they have to do with wizards? And Sev's father was … all this? And the rest of the drunks were decorated veterans? Lily looked at the date of the paper … why hadn't someone said something to Severus so he could get home? Or did no one care to help him get there? He could apparate well enough in class to get himself there, if they got permission. Maybe she could go too? What about his mum? She didn't have an owl. Maybe she could … apparate up here? Lily didn't know.

Lily looked over at the Slytherin table. Sev was still sitting with the younger lads, and his raven was on his shoulder. She agreed that Phi was in danger from other students. Owls were rather common, but even they were targeted by the toerags around here. How should she tell him? Just hand him the newspaper? Open to this page or the front page? Now or wait till breakfast was over so she didn't look real obvious going over there?

She became distracted because it appeared an intense discussion had gotten underway at the Head Table, and Hagrid's voice carried … something about Slughorn. The staff that were here had their copies of the paper open. Lazy ass probably decided to accept someone's invitation to go to Majorca, rather than get Severus home. She flipped through her copy looking for Slughorn doing something juvenile. Maybe with the headmaster, he was away and missed dinner AND dessert yesterday.

Before she hit the sports section at the back, Lily found Eileen Snape, 1930-1977, widowed … well, now she would have been, one son, Severus. Died at home.

Looking over, it looked like the Slytherins were finding it too, but only Lily knew what happened to his father. She stood … it was too late. Sev was looking at it now. Obviously the widowed needed explanation, but Prof. Abstractus got there way before her and left with Sev, even though she called out. Lily changed direction to speak to Prof. McGonagall.

***********************************

Orion Black was incensed when Cygnus told him that Bellatrix's, and subsequently the Black family, claim to the Lestrange fortune was being held up by the Ministry since muggle witnesses claimed she murdered both Rodolphus and Rabastan. The only two heirs left between her and the immense Lestrange fortune. Was she fucking insane? The whole reason they married her to Rodolphus and she threw it away?

Andromeda marrying a muggle, his eldest son, Sirius, no longer welcome in England, all they had left for the next generation was Narcissa and his dutiful son, Regulus. Only Regulus would carry their proud name onward at this point. He advised his close cousin that perhaps Druella still had another one in her. Walburga was older than him, so unless she passed soon, Orion would have no more children of his own to bank the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black on.

***********************************

Severus was puzzling out his mother's obituary, when Prof. Abstractus interrupted his thoughts about 'widowed'. He already knew from Pettigrew, that the magic quill that scribed these might literally take his father predeceased his mother by seconds made her a widow, rather than something happening to his father that left his mother alone for a longer period of time. The school would have known, if something happened to his father before now. There were plenty of students from muggle families, and Hogwarts had its own magic quills. One put all their names in a book as they were born, and another wrote their letters notifying them that they were admitted to Hogwarts.

Somehow they ended up in the Arithmancy teacher's office. Atlas tried to floo Slughorn. The flames turned green, but there was no reply.

Sighing, Severus sat down. His teacher met his eyes briefly, but turned away. He knew Abstractus was not good with emotional type things. Severus was not carrying on, but he had no idea what had happened yet. He'd rather wait till he knew something. However, he'd like some information soon. Sitting around here was not helping.

It was unlikely the Prophet's quill was in error. Severus thought he should have felt something, even if he did not know what it was at the time. Something mysterious and magical. He had very few people in his life so if one of them died, he would expect some sign.

While occupying himself with cataloging the different anecdotal evidence regarding death of loved ones and possible spells, Prof. Abstractus' grate flared green.

"Atlas?" asked Prof. McGonagall.

"Yes, Minerva?"

"Any luck with Horace?"

"No."

"Is Severus with you?"

"Yes."

"I'm going to come through."

Prof. McGonagall spun a full turn out of the fireplace, but did it gracefully. Her eyes focused on Severus, "Miss Evans had received mail this morning, and she had details regarding your father. He was killed by Death Eaters."

"Death Eaters? My father was a muggle. My family has nothing to do with that."

"I think it best if you were to be taken home immediately. I would, Severus, but with the Headmaster away, I need to stay at the school. Prof. Sprout will meet you in the Front Hall. She and other teachers gladly volunteered to escort you."

Severus felt it was rather late to go home. His mother was dead already. At least it wasn't Slughorn, he didn't want that bastard in his house, probably demand he serve him tea and cake or some other asinine thing. "Alright," he replied, starting to blink rapidly. He can't cry. He needed to retrieve his cloak from Slytherin. There was a need for thought, crying could come later once he knew what he needed to cry over. "I need to go to the dungeons for my cloak."

"I'll come with you," Minerva said with uncharacteristic warmth.

He nodded and silently led the way from the seventh floor downwards, while he thought. Lily. Why would Lily know how his father died? It did not happen yesterday or probably even the day before. Death Eaters meant the Ministry knew. Did they even connect the Death Eaters in a town that had no wizards at all with two Hogwarts students? They had a case from last summer, unless Potter and Black's family had them burn it, as if it never happened.

Returning his mind to the original thought, his mother had been on her own for at least two days. Did she suffer? Was she even aware his father did not come home? Was it lack of food, water or heat that finally killed her? She could have fallen on the stairs, if she went to get her wand. During the winter, especially this cold, she would have been in the kitchen till it was time for bed. The stove kept the house warm, but it was the only room that was comfortable enough for someone to sit still. There was a tiny one in his parents' bedroom that they used at night when it got like this. He remembered sleeping in there … when the ice got thick on top of the river, and the wind could be felt moving the walls and the second floor swayed. There would be ice on the inside of his bedroom window, and the water that his mother put in the pitcher for him at night would also get ice on top. One time it froze completely and broke open, but she fixed that.

Severus unwarded his redecorated 'blood traitor' trunk and got his cloak.

"Perhaps you can leave your familiar here? Birds like that in a muggle town ..."

"I can't leave her here. It's too dangerous. She doesn't care for Evans either for me to leave her with Lily. She doesn't need to stay on my shoulder, or she can go back to the Clock Tower. It's cold so she'll find her way back into the school, and might get into trouble."

Minerva's lips thinned as she thought and looked around. There was no cage for it in here, and Holy …! She looked at the other boys' retreats, and looked at Snape's again. His and another were ... unobjectionable. "Mr. Snape, please point out to me who sleeps where in this room."

Severus rather expected that question once he saw her peer into Mulciber's feast for the eyes. "_Muffliato." _He gave her that information and then suggested, "If the bird is coming with me … I can say more ..."

"Yes, as long as you are cautious."

"Mulciber's trunk is what you'll find most interesting, Professor. He only has the tame things on the walls." That could turn into an interesting circular case of circumstance. This started when Severus' father was killed by Death Eaters, and it ends up with the vile stash of pornography that Mulciber enjoyed and used to lure other lads into discussions about what they'd like to do with mudblood and muggle women. Severus understood that talk of high ideals and principles usually hid something else, but luring teen boys into pureblood rhetoric with dirty pictures? Was it only him that saw it was not a doorway to an ideal wizarding utopia? Of course, being a worthless half-blooded blood traitor, his insignificant mind could not comprehend such things.

***********************************

Bellatrix had made up her mind about the order in which to avenge her humiliation and painful treatment. First to the continent, to sort little baby Sirius, and then to wipe that filthy, putrescent pimple of a muggle town off the map, leaving only a smoldering crater.

She was interrupted from her musing of how she was going to make little ickle Sirry cry when the orgasmic pain of her master summoning her shot through her arm and washed over her body. She allowed herself a brief moment of enjoyment with her head lolling back and her toes curling in ecstasy before she apparated to kneel before the man she loved.

"My Lord."

"Bella, Bella, Bella," Voldemort crooned. "Do you see your service to me as a way to improve your circumstances?"

"Of course, my Lord."

"_Crucio._"

Releasing the spell, he then asked, "And who says who should live or die, my dear Bella?"

"You, only you, my Lord."

"Exactly. _Avada Kedavra._"

***********************************

Prof. Sprout attempted to take his hand a number of times during their walk to the gates. Severus eventually crossed his arms shoved his hands under his armpits, pretending he was that cold to stop the awkwardness. He wished Lily was with him for the walk. Severus did not want her to see his dead mother, but other than that, he'd like her company. Lily was all he had left … except for this damned bird.

He had to allow his hand to be held for the side-along apparating. It was more unpleasant when someone else did the deed. After scanning the colorless river bank, Severus knew where they were and started off, with the frozen reeds snapping off as he pushed through them. Phi left his shoulder.

The river appeared to be frozen solid. When they were little, he and Lily speculated that there was very little water left in the river, since so much else ended up in it. Even when it was frozen, old habits die hard. There was a lot of refuse thrown atop it, waiting for the river to thaw and get washed away downstream to a town that must be that much filthier than theirs. Even with the bitter cold, the smell of … home was still identifiable. Without the mud, it was easier to walk along the river, rather than risk what could be outdoors laying in wait for pedestrians in the warren of narrow streets and houses around Spinner's End.

Severus led Prof. Sprout through the alley next to his house so they could use the front door. He doubted that either of his parents had cleared in front of the kitchen door. Although that would make it so much simpler to go out back to use the garden. There were times Severus doubted he could be their son since he thought so much differently than them.

He went up to the door and asked admittance. It opened for him. Severus hesitated before stepping out of Prof. Sprout's way, and glanced about a bit before jerking his head, urging Phi to shoot into the open door so hopefully no one saw a large bird just happened to fly into the house.

Prof. Sprout had already lit her wandtip. "Is there anyone else besides you and your parents?"

"No, professor. She's most likely in the kitchen. It's warmest there with the stove."

Severus turned and pushed at the kitchen door. He heard the glass bottles being pushed on the other side of the door. His mother had gotten up after his father had left the house for the last time, or at least moved enough to knock bottles around.

His mother was in her chair. He walked around, since she was facing the windows, as she normally did. It was a relief that her eyes were closed. Her tea cup was empty and placed on the table, as if waiting for a refill.

He could not resist touching her as he took a deep breath and his eyes teared up.

Initially, Prof. Sprout had planned to stay close to her student, but that plan sort of went out to the window when she reached the kitchen doorway and froze. Shoddy furniture with walls covered in books was plausible, but this …

After a couple harder pokes to convince himself that his mother was not sleeping, despite the lack of visible respiration. Severus wiped his eyes and concentrated. This may be his only opportunity to figure out … whatever. There was a smell of urine, not unexpected since she was without father for longer than was reasonable.

He moved to look at the coal bin. Empty. In this sort of cold, his father ensured it was completely filled every week when he was paid. Whether it was one or six days from that date till his father's death, Severus did not know. From the way the scoop was dropped on the floor, that was from his mother. His father put things away. Which reminded him … no dirty dishes. She had not eaten, or at least off a plate or from a bowl since his father last ate with her.

He cast a temperature taking charm on his mother, then a normal one on the room. Memorizing those two numbers, Severus would need to look up how fast a body cooled. Dead the entire night? Or early this morning, just before the newspaper was printed? It was cold in here. For her body to still be in the high 80s (F, 30-32C) … he suspected that she was not deceased very long. Maybe because she was dressed warmly, it was keeping the body heat trapped. He cast a timing charm onto the table. He could take her temperature again and work out how fast she was cooling by the differences in time and temperature.

There was nothing resembling a written message. Severus even looked at the mildewed ceiling. Her wand? If it were on her … he did not want to search through her clothing. It would be easier to look upstairs, but should he leave her? He was getting choked up again ... he didn't want to leave her. He should have been here for her to take care of her. She was his mother. Others might not think she was much, but she was the only one he had.

Phi glided in past Prof. Sprout's patched hat and landed on his shoulder. Ravens did things to bodies, especially eyes if he remembered, or was that just something that was said to scare people? Maybe he should take her upstairs and put her in his room till they left.

"Professor, I'm going to look upstairs. Could you please not alter the temperature in this room? I'm curious about my mother's … um, so I … well anyway. Could you excuse me?" Severus did not know why she was here if she did not expect that it was likely they'd find his mother's body. If she gave it some thought, this was probably as good as it could be. No blood, eyes closed, sitting nice in a chair, rather than twisted and mangled in some way.

Pomona started … this was … all the bottles … she shuddered and got out of the way, stepping into the kitchen. Normally, she felt at home in the kitchen. It was her favorite room in any house. Well, unless they had a particularly spectacular greenhouse attached, but that usually meant an excellent kitchen to match. She understood how the stove worked, and repeated Severus' observation that there was no longer any fuel. The stockpot on the stove contained a liquidy mixture, with a wave of her wand, Pomona got a few bits of solid matter to come off the bottom. There were coarse, black hairs on one of them. Not encouraging.

Guiltily, she picked up and examined one of the bottles. Spirits, as she thought. Muggle, but there was a great deal of information on the label. That was quite helpful … 25% alcohol was as strong as what wizarding equivalent? Who drank all these ... his mother ... his father ... both of them?

There was no bread box or something to keep food chilled so she started looking through the cabinets. She found the shelf containing the only food, a partially used can of oatmeal with an illustration of a strapping highlander on it, a tin of something called mushy mint sauce, that Pomona paused to read contained peas, not some sort of dressing for lamb, but supposed that was a possibility, an almost empty lidded tube of beef gravy granules, gooseberries in syrup, and finally a tin of new potato's [_sic_].

She continued searching, but did not find anything else other than that many cabinets were empty. They had a limited number of mismatched dishes, but all were put away neatly, sorted by common use. Pots were stored underneath. Not many. Even the kettle was stored beneath. Bit backwards to keep that other pot out, and not the kettle.

Scratching her head, Pomona realized the sink drained through a pipe out the back wall. Nothing kept the cold air out, or whatever could crawl up it. She placed her hand over the drain, but it was not drafty. Ah, probably charmed. That was somewhat better … but no water coming in, or a simple pump? There were two buckets. Not ones she would even use to carry water for her plants.

Upstairs, Severus shut Phi into his bedroom before entering his parents' room. The bed was perfectly made. His mother had not been up here since his father left. He opened the lid on the lengthwise box where her wand was kept, and took it out. If she had it with her, would it have made a difference? He looked at it and got weepy again. Severus did not know what he was supposed to do here. He knew it was nice of Prof. Sprout to bring him here, but she didn't seem to be helping.

He opened a drawer, still despairing that he had no clue what he should be doing. His parents did not have a lot of things. His mother's clothes were all the same black things she currently had on. She rarely wore undergarments, but they were black too. Not like Lily's frilly, lacy things with designs printed on them. Mother probably had on wool tights with a pair of woolen socks in a pair of his father's boots that had been shrunk down enough to fit her feet. Once it got warm enough, she usually went barefoot and then got hurt stepping on things.

In the smaller drawers of the chest, he found some boxes. Gobstones, more gobstones, a chess set, and gobstones with keys. Probably to vaults and houses full of gobstones, he thought sarcastically. Some of these stone were quite nice looking, but Severus never caught onto the purpose of the game. It seemed like a waste of time and then to get something spit in your face? He could get that talking to most of Slytherin when they did not want homework assistance. Some of the keys may be Gringotts keys. They had numbers on them like the one he had. Perhaps more of the Prince books were in them, or if Severus was given permission to use these, store his mother's books there? He could probably fit a lot of them in the empty vault to which he had a key. They were probably safe here for now. No one in Spinner's End would think his parents were storing valuables here, and his mother's magic on the house seemed to have held since it was based on family ties. As long as Severus was alive, well, once he was dead, what did he care what happened to books?

The last box on the bottom of the drawer was full of parchment. He rolled his eyes at the top one naming his mother captain of the Hogwarts Gobstones team in September, 1945 and shut the lid. Sighing, he decided he should take this to look through later. He also picked out the keys and put them with the chess set. Lily had a chess set from a Christmas cracker. Not that he felt like playing, but if she wanted a game, he now had one.

He found his father's drawers to be more useful. Newer jumpers and braces, and best of all, socks that were practically new. Severus also took the better pairs of trousers.

His father's medals were altogether in one case in the bottom drawer. Severus had seen them before, and realized this case was procured for this set since they fit neatly, with the ribbons flat, but there was no room in it for more. He had vague recollections about his father talking about some of it … but it was a jumble. His mother's fairy tales of Hogwarts and magic sort of erased them. He looked at the engraved brass plaque on the outside, his father's name, 40 Commando Royal Marines and Per Mare Per Terram. There was also more paperwork. It was probably more substantial in content than his mother's, so Severus added it to the top of her box of paper. At least he could count on his father not to puzzle him by saving boxes of marbles.

Turning back to close the drawer, there were ticket stubs left on the bottom that were smaller than the paper he grabbed. He felt ridiculous as he started crying again. They were from the two times his father took him to Manchester matches. He couldn't remember if it was a bus or coach, but a lot of the other fellows went, along with some boys that were older than Severus. He could still remember the scores as he looked at the tickets. Manchester beat Chelsea 2-1 on 19 March 1963, and Leyton Orient 3-1 on 18 May 1963. His favorite player was George Best, who was a new winger and started playing for the club at only 17.

The first one against Chelsea was important. His father told him repeatedly what a privilege it was to attend this game, he should be on his best behavior and not say stupid things. He did well, behaved better than the older boys, answered questions only when directly asked by others, and his father was happy with him. Severus rethought that last bit – happy? Yes, his father had been very pleased. If not, he would not have burdened himself with Severus for the second match.

That one did not go as well. Mancester won, of course, but Severus was given a lot to eat by the fellows with them, especially candy. That's why he didn't like sweets. Now he remembered. He felt ill and he was going to throw up, but he didn't. He remembered his father would be very angry if he did, but how … maybe wandless magic? He still felt terrible but they got home alright without his father yelling or hitting him so it seemed like another success, but his mother did something while they were away … what did she do? There was a lot of yelling, but Severus was so sick he spent all night out back, laying in the garden, curled up and holding his stomach, with cramps and diarrhea.

His father would take him to watch the games at the pub now and again, but they never went to see any more played in person. Severus tried to remember more about those outings. He couldn't read well yet. There was a lot of drinking and going into bathrooms. Severus knew to stick close to his father, and father would pick him up and hold him so he could see better. He couldn't recall his father telling him anything specific or important, but Severus had been three at the time so Tobias' mates were the ones his father would actually converse with.

Opening the chest where they stored spare bedding, almost empty since all the blankets were on the bed, Severus grabbed a worn pillowcase and packed his new clothes. In a second one, he put a better pair of steel-toed boots, the paperwork, his mothers wand in its box, his father's medals and the chess set with keys. Shrunken down, they fit nicely into his trouser pockets.

Stumped by his next course of action, Severus sat down on the edge of his parents' bed and looked around the room, even at the ceiling. It was in worse shape than his. Standing, he closed their door and looked at the back of it. There was no special message meant exclusively for him, was there? It was rather childish to think there would be, but he really wanted one. He scanned the room again, hoping he missed something.

He opened the door, and started because Prof. Sprout was on the landing and she had lit it. Ugh. Their house was much better kept dark. There was dirt and dead bugs, even up on the ceiling in old cobwebs. The walls were distressed, with gouges of plaster missing and whatever wood supports inside it exposed. Severus was used to it. His parents used to argue much more, and each of them and objects would frequently come into contact with furniture, walls and doors. The bottom of his own door was heavily scarred with kick marks. Since it was the outside, those would have been made by his parents. Severus kicked the inside of the door.

"Your parents' bedroom?"

Did she feel she was entitled to a tour of the house for bringing him here? "Yes, professor," he replied, without removing himself from their doorway. He closed it, waiting for her to object.

"And this is...?" she asked, indicating the only other door up here.

"My room." He opened the door since he figured he was done up here and needed to retrieve the bird. Phi had not damaged anything. Nothing was out of place, and no farewell missives were left on his dresser or his washstand.

Prof. Sprout was standing in the doorway. He was annoyed. Did she expect something palatial and grandiose? Maybe she was realizing the rest of the staff tricked her into thinking she would be doing a good deed this morning. Well, there was no reward waiting for her in Spinner's End.

"Excuse me."

"Oh, pardon me, Severus," she replied as she backed up against his parents' door.

He closed his door and descended the stairs. She had left the door to the parlor open and had also lit this room. He gave a particular shelf a furtive glance to make sure the Dark Arts books appeared under illusionary titles regarding housekeeping. There were no truly dangerous ones. His mother had told him about books that were protected with vortexes that sucked in the unwary browser, or that had demons spring forth. None of their books did anything as spectacular as that.

It would take time to find anything his mother could have hidden in these, he thought, while looking at the dust on the front of each shelf to see if she had moved any of them recently. After circling the room, he supposed she no longer read. Like him, she had read all these books.

Prof. Sprout was watching him look at the shelves. He was stuck by the thought that she might find housekeeping books interesting. Hufflepuffs did not necessarily love cooking and cleaning, but she might want to check them since obviously no one in the house ever applied the knowledge that should be in them.

For now, she seemed focused on him, so he gambled and went through to the kitchen. His mother appeared undisturbed. He took a temperature reading of her and the room again. The room was the same, so using the time elapsed, Severus calculated that she had been dead perhaps six hours now. If Lily's mail had arrived one day earlier, he could have kept this from happening. It wasn't the fault of either one of them, or even her parents. Her owl could only go so fast, if it should even be out in this weather. Without the Evans, his father's demise would be a mystery. Obviously the Ministry does not contact the relatives of Death Eater victims. Too busy with important things like casting Unforgivables, rather than assisting people. If young Barty Crouch Jr. did not hate his father so much, he would currently be in terrible danger. If it wasn't for He Who Must Not Be Named, they'd probably be in deep shit. With that nutter, at least murder and disappearances could happen every day, and the'good guys' could shrug it off as beyond their control.

Prof. Sprout had followed him.

"What are we going to do with her, professor?" he asked

"Oh, isn't there other family?"

"No," he replied shortly. Severus was sure she had already asked that when they first entered the house.

"Friends?"

"My mother's health was not good. She has not left the house in years. She talks to no one other than my father and I."

"I see," Pomona said, beginning to actually see. Without his father … rather odd, a muggle taking care of a witch, but not impossible.

"Should we contact someone? We can't leave her here."

"You're right, Severus." Other students had family to take care of everything that needed to be done.

"I don't think the muggles expect her here. Is there some Ministry organization?"

"For what?"

"Death certificate? Autopsy? Don't they need to look at her at least? Or do I write a letter?"

"The notice in the newspaper is enough."

He raised an eyebrow. If What's His Name wanted to do things smart, he'd stop having his idiot cronies stop putting Dark Marks above his victims' homes. Fill the paper with 'died at home's, and no one would bat an eyelash.

Muggles did things totally different. Severus had seen enough dead bodies collected out of Spinner's End to know that. They cared how people died, and asked a lot of questions. That's why anyone hiding a crime usually dumped it somewhere else. Their river was not swift enough to move a body most of the time. It sort of lazily floated along. Only dunderheads from out of town did that sort of thing.

To clarify what he thought she was getting at, Severus asked, "So the body is my responsibility? I could simply leave it here, professor?"

"You shouldn't do that."

"What do you suggest I do with it?"

"Perhaps inter your mother with your father?"

"Has he already been … interred?" he asked. As a muggle, hopefully he wasn't left lying about like wizards did with their dead.

"Don't you know, Severus?"

"How would I?"

"Perhaps we can check the family plot?"

"What is that?" he asked. Plot? Plan? He doubted his parents planned for something like this. Everyone realized they would die one day, however his parents never acted like they cared in front of him.

"Is there a town cemetery?"

"That's on the other side, away from the river."

***********************************

Lily was in Charms with Mary, waiting for class to begin. They were not in the back, but in Mary's usual place where she used to sit with Helen. Lily was worried about Severus, and Mary's questions since the beginning of lunch were not helping her nerves.

Prof. Flitwick entered, signaling for them to quiet down. As he closed the door behind himself, a hand grabbed it and pulled it back open. Severus and Phi slipped past and headed for his usual seat high in the back.

Filius did not take points from Snape since his slight tardiness was forgotten. He had not expected him in class for a while.

A lot of students were looking open-mouthed at Snape. Even Slytherins forgot themselves.

Lily was sorely tempted to backhand Mary when she got prodded, "What's he doing here?"

"How the hell should I know?"

Mary gathered her things, "I should go sit with him."

Lily thrust her foot out intentionally. Mary MacDonald went down in a noisy heap.

"Settle down class. Miss MacDonald, please resume your seat."

Fuming because Severus was behind her so she couldn't see him without making an ass out of herself, Lily ground her teeth together so forcefully that it was hard to hear what Prof. Flitwick was saying regarding today's lesson. Figures, it was something new.

Mary glared at Lily, rather than paying attention. She put her foot out on purpose. Severus needed her, and now he was stuck back there alone.

Other than Severus, no one concentrated on casting. Some tried to sneak glances his way, others openly stared, and the rest spent the lesson hissing whispered questions and crazier answers. Among the open stares was Avery. He was scared shitless. Someone who could shrug off the death of his own mother? … and that was following up on torturing Pettigrew to death for close to a week, probably right here in the school under Dumbledore's crooked nose, eliminating the other Marauders, attacking a poltergeist, whatever that was that looked like a raven, and he and Mulciber could be next on his list for whatever Dark Arts he felt like testing out on them. Mulciber was getting good with _Imperius_, but Avery did not think it a good idea to try on Snape. If it failed, Snape would literally destroy him. Who would help them? Slughorn? His father had been one of his favorites, but not him. Mulciber was barely tolerated for his quidditch playing, his only real purpose here was to spend his free time recruiting, and he wasn't great at it. That's why he had to develop his _Imperius _to at least give the impression that some were recruited and ready to serve. Once they took the Mark, there was no turning away from the Dark Lord.

Annoyed that his class was not paying attention, Prof. Flitwick warned, "If I do not see progress, I will start taking points and handing out detentions."

That temporarily got students trying to figure out what was going on with Charms, instead of Mr. Snape. He climbed towards the back, casting glowers at anyone who looked back here, before reaching the subject of so much speculation. "Very good, Mr. Snape. Excellent definition and wand movement. Two points to Slytherin." Flitwick turned to face the class and gave a number of students dark glares to get them to return to their work. Lowering his voice, he said, "I am deeply sorry to hear of your loss. If you need time away from class, please feel free to take it."

"Sulking in my dormitory is not going to help matters."

"I meant away from the school."

"If I did not return with Prof. Sprout, I had no other way of getting back, professor. I am grateful she took me home, and we were able to take care of my mother's body."

Filius' face tightened in concerned concentration. Minerva had told them later in the morning that Snape's father had also passed this week. He should not be at school at all, but Pomona did bring him back. She must have some reason. If there was anyone that was compassionate among the staff, it was Pomona. "Very well then. Please carry on."

Descending the stairs, he said, "Since I just gave points to Slytherin, Mr. Avery, how about you settle for a detention? And five points from Gryffindor, Miss MacDonald. Now all of you, to work."

Since he was ahead of the rest of the class, Severus took some time to write down some notes. He did not know what he wanted to do, but he did not want to forget any important details. He knew exactly how incompetent dunderheads got their jobs in the Ministry – Slughorn. Slughorn and his favorites. He'd pick at them till they scabbed over repeatedly and were scarred for life for letting his mother die.

***********************************

Horace Slughorn was besieged by harpies. Minerva's knickers were in a twist over him having a bit of a lie-in this morning. He'd like to see her watch all these students in the evening and then be able to rise early in the morning. Albus would have to do something about this. Anyways, it did not matter what time he got up this morning since the hens decided to handle it among themselves, and Pomona took it upon herself, with Minerva's blessing, to whisk away Snape. Good riddance to the carbuncle was all he had to say. There weren't any Princes left for him to be bothered. He doubted Snape was related to anyone magical still left alive. Horace only attended important funerals.

He had barely set foot in the staff room to see if there was a crumb of a little snack left laying about, when Pomona set upon him. Although surprised that she was already back from the bunghole of England, there was no reason why she should take that sort of tone with him. He was senior to her, and really her Hufflepuff sensibilities had no place in whatever she was babbling on about. Snape was not a Hufflepuff. It was her own damned fault for sticking her mud-smirched nose where it didn't belong.

Albus better get back soon. The womenfolk were getting delusions of grandeur, and thinking they ran the place. Merlin's balls! After detention, he might meet Hagrid so they could nip off to the Hog's Head. In fact, maybe detention could be cut a little short tonight. Oak-aged mead might not be enough, he felt like a firewhiskey night was coming on.

***********************************

Severus Snape was besieged by harpies. Lily and MacDonald both set upon him at the end of Charms, and when he told them he did not want to talk about anything on their way to Defense, they didn't shut up, but talked to each other about him. What the fuck was wrong with them? He went into the gents' for a moment's peace, and came out to find them waiting for him.

He scanned the room when they got to Defense, and wedged an unoccupied desk between Wilkes and Rosier, where there had been no room for another desk, and took a seat. He allowed Phi to do his glaring for him while he allowed his hair to fall forward and cover his face for the entire class period.

At least the Defense teacher did not approach him with any platitudes. He hardly remembered their names, even after having them in class for six months. Younger Slytherins had changed their robes for a class, and he took points from Gryffindor when they did amusing things for their Hufflepuff classmates' amusement.

When class was dismissed, MacDonald launched herself at him, asking "Are you upset, Severus?"

Rosier and Wilkes both snapped at her, while most of the class openly stared at the crazy Gryffindor. Severus did not respond, and Lily scrambled to get near him as he exited the classroom. She got next to him by shouldering her way down the stairs and grabbed his left hand, even though Phi was riding on his left shoulder.

Severus tightened his hand and murmured, "Lily."

***********************************

Rita Skeeter had an excellent nose for a story. Sometimes it merely took a little time to come together. An ugly boy was not a story. A poor, ugly, hard-working, heroic boy who lost his mother would appeal to _Witch Weekly_ readers. It needed length and more pictures. The witches liked pictures. Wasn't it Rita herself that coined the phrase 'a picture is worth a thousand words'? She had a lovely one of him grouting tile in a school lavatory. She wondered if he had any more clothing like that. But first, she needed to pen her condolences to the poor boy.

***********************************

Lily and Mary were confused when they reached the library. Severus was not at their usual hidden away table for four, but with Wilkes, Rosier, Black, Crouch and another boy at the Wilkes/Rosier table for six. The youngest boy that Lily could not for the life of her remember his name, was telling some story about a giant. The other Slytherins appeared to barely listen to him as he made wild hand gestures to illustrate the action, and boldly smiled when he inserted himself into the tale as the savior of the victimized village.

Waiting politely till the young man completed his description of the gratitude bestowed upon him, Lily then placed her hands on Severus' shoulders. "Hey, Sev. Are you getting caught up with the fellows?"

He leaned back slightly and turned his head to look up at her, "Yes, Lily. I have a little more to do. Did you need me?"

"Um, it can wait. I'll be over at our regular table, if you need me. Alright?"

"Alright."

Lily sighed as she trudged over to where Mary had already flounced over in a huff. She was angry at Severus, Malcolm and Evan for earlier, rather than realizing it was her that started it with such a stupid question. She was also not happy with Lily either.

***********************************

Success! Unquestionably perfect success! Potions using freshly harvested augurey eyes from live augureys existed, but were hardly worth brewing due to the cost of the properly harvested eyes and rareness of the bird.

However, the substitution of this odd blend of morning glory flowers and pine cone was genius. Sheer genius. Simple ingredients that were easy to obtain, prepare and brew. This young man could be the next Golpalott, and Joe Rue, an obscure American brewer who understood arithmancy, was the one to first believe in him and give his theories a chance. Thank you, Atlas Abstractus!

Hastily he penned a letter to Abstractus, and then got to work on their submission for _The Practical Potioneer_.

***********************************

Severus was thankful that Lily allowed him to sit in silence with their arms around each other this evening, rather than her claiming a good shag was all he needed. He was not sure if he'd look at anything tonight, he might be simply too wakeful thinking so he already told her that he would not meet her tomorrow morning. He had a lot on his mind and felt time was needed to have the pieces start to fit together. Severus had no idea of how many things were influencing his life, or he'd boil it down to some simple arithmancy.

Mr. Filch was rather quiet tonight, but gave him his assignment off the Front Hall. Severus had barely started when he heard voices. Slughorn was leaving with Hagrid. No detentions tonight? No, Avery had one. Severus smirked at that thought, teachers assigning detention and then Slughorn not making anyone serve it?

However, this might give Severus the opportunity to try something while Slughorn was out of the building. He set a detection charm on the front door for Slughorn, finished his work, reported its completion to Mr. Filch and then headed down into the dungeons and turned towards Slughorn's office, rather than his common room.

After a couple ward detections, Severus nodded. Alarmed for tampering, but Severus could cast one spell really well, and it could pass into the office since Slughorn did not ward the door against spell penetration.

Concentrating on his targeted space, currently unseen behind the door, Severus cast _finite incantatem. _

Oh darn, it sounded like some of Prof. Slughorn's precious memorabilia and valuables might have been damaged. What a shame. Perhaps broken glass got in his crystallized pineapple.

***********************************

Lily crumpled up the parchment that she had been attempting to use to answer her mother's letter, and snarled, "Will you shut up already, Mary? Not everything is about you."

"I didn't say this was about me, but ..."

"I do not care what half-baked theories you have about Severus and his parents. You don't understand anything."

"I understand Severus better than you ever will, Lily Evans."

Lily threw her hands in the air, expressing her disgust at the girl who supposed Sev's mother died while pining for his father. She had a letter to write, homework to finish, and perhaps at some point would fall asleep with a headache after thinking about Severus. Things were horribly wrong. They could get incredibly worse. That's the only reason Lily had reined in her natural impulses with Severus. He was terribly hurt, but things with Severus took time. She couldn't shake the tears out of him. And Hogwarts … the feeling of betrayal stabbed her through the heart. This went deeper than the utter disappointment that the staff's blind eye to the Marauders had inspired. She suspected they could have known about his father's death, which should have gotten Sev home to take care of his mother, but a morning off of class for the death of both parents? Bastards.

***********************************

Severus lay in bed and stared at his mother's wand in his left hand. Maybe there were some wand books in the library could explain what he could do with it. This wand liked him, and it would be handy to have a spare wand in case Sirius Black showed up one day to continue bashing his head into a wall.

Once the practicality of having a second wand finished with his head, impractical depression seeped in.

Although a witch should outlive a muggle, logically he knew that his mother should die prior to his father due to her lack of living. He imagined he would have returned home one day, his father would tell him mother was dead, and that would have been it. To have the opposite situation occur was improbable. Severus should have been prepared for this in some way. He wasn't. It was his fault for relying on others … even if it was to laugh in his face when his father died, and he'd have to leave school to tend to his mother. That's what should have happened. However, Severus failed his mother and she was dead too. Thanks to his lack of foresight.

***********************************

When there was a knock on the door, Albus called, "Come in."

"Ah, you are in today. You snuck out while my back was turned yesterday," chastised Tom, as he carried a heavily laden breakfast tray into the room.

"Breakfast meeting, Tom. Totally slipped my mind to let you know."

"No worries, Professor. Are you still departing today?"

"Alas, I must return to Hogwarts. It seems I stay here longer each time."

"Things would be so much worse if you weren't, professor. They're damned lucky at the Ministry that you're helpin'."

Looking over the tray, Albus exclaimed, "Raspberry jam. You remembered, Tom."

"Course I did."

"Thank you, my friend. You make my stays in London delightful."

"That's alright, professor. Just remember to let all your friends know how much you enjoy the Leaky Cauldron."

Laughing, Albus agreed, "I certainly will."

With a satisfied sigh, he sat down. Tom made a wonderful breakfast. Albus prepared his tea, arranged his toast, sliced off a bite of a thick-skinned, juicy sausage and chewed it blissfully with his eyes closed before he unfolded the newspaper.

When it started to look like the most exciting thing was a sale at Gladrags, an unexpected obituary caught his eye. He immediately stood to leave for the Ministry. Albus did not know what this meant, but Bellatrix Lestrange was dead a week after the other Lestranges. Surely, Barty would have some insight into it.

***********************************

Phi was unhappy, or at least that's what Severus was interpreting from her when owls dared to come near him. Four. Four letters in one day for him. Where were owls when he needed them, he considered darkly. The optimistic spark that still existed in him, no matter how much Severus tried to extinguish it, hinted that perhaps these could be from former acquaintances of his mother's.

His mood lightened with the first letter bearing condolences from Xeno Lovegood. Severus could not be mad at him for writing. That was the only person that would believe him when he tried to tell his tale of the Ministry's incompetence. Severus still needed time to calm down in order to be able to discuss it rationally. Perhaps writing it down logically would help organize his thoughts and find the holes in his knowledge of what happened.

Frank Longbottom also wrote. He certainly was persistent. The joke was on him though since he obviously missed that dark wizards and those that loved the Dark Arts loved no one, not ever their own mothers. How could that be left out of auror training? Let's say that Severus went on to become Severus the Slimy, since 'the foul' and 'the oddball' had already been taken, and aurors put his mother under the _cruciatus_ curse. Wouldn't he only laugh in their faces? Not that would have an impact since aurors would probably enjoy torturing helpless, old women. Letting them slowly starve, or die of cold or thirst were hardly kinder options.

Mr. Filch wrote him likewise. Or at least that's who claimed to sign this short and simple, nice note. Hmm. It was … unexpected. Not that he didn't consider Mr. Filch literate, but that he'd take the time to observe social niceties and write a student.

He had saved the feminine looking letter for last, as the best possibility for one of his mother's old friends. It was very disappointing. It was that Rita Skeeter. What did she want with him? Severus did not feel he currently had an Order of Merlin, First Class in him right now. Quite the opposite, unless she was preparing to write her new biography after he destroyed the Ministry – Severus Snape, Psychopath or Saint? No, that wasn't any good. Wizards would not understand that psychopath began with a 's' sound. Screwball? He was distracted from his search for the perfect S word by the sight of Mulciber trying to clean out his ear with the handle of a spoon. Obviously, Stylish and Slytherin were antonyms. Since he was already reserving the word Slimy for his future Dark Wizard title, Severus thought of Scummy, Sordid, Squalid, Scurvied, Sleazy, Soiled, Slovenly, Sloppy, Stained, Sullied, Swinish, Shabby, Shamed, Sickening, Stinking and Slughorn to describe the House of Slytherin that contained the likes of Mulciber.

***********************************

"Oh dear, oh dear," Horace muttered loudly to gain the attention of the staff present as he began perusing his pile of correspondence. He was holding in front of him a missive on very fine milled parchment, indicating it was a communication from someone of importance. He paused for effect, then heavily sighed, "It's so sad when someone dies so young. Mrs. Bellatrix Lestrange, and now her sister's nuptials, Narcissa Black that is, to that fine Lucius Malfoy will have to be postponed. Such a shame to put love on hold like that, when young Narcissa most needs a strong shoulder to cry on. I only hope that the new date they choose is convenient ..."

His musing was ruined as he stood screaming in pain. Horace cast a numbing charm on himself.

"Oh, silly me," Pomona Sprout uttered apologetically. "I'm so sorry I spilled the teapot on you, Horace. I was so taken with your sad news that it slipped right out of my fingers."

"You'll want to put some butter on that," Minerva suggested helpfully.

"Oh no," Filius disagreed. "Cold. You should go outside, drop your trousers and lie face down in the snow, Horace."

"Don't go anywhere yet," Atlas said, already having a scrap of parchment and stub of a pencil flying over it as he arithmatically searched for a means to ease his colleague's pain. "Ah, I found it. You'll want to use dirigible plum paste on that, Horace. The orange staining will be a harmless side effect, but I think it should be well within the acceptable parameters."

"The hell with the lot of you. I'm going to the Infirmary. Poppy can treat my burn."

A number of them chorused the correction, "Scald."

"Whatever," he replied.

Minerva watched him exit with thinned lips, then muttered, "Bellatrix Lestrange? Good riddance to rubbish. If she wasn't a Death Eater, I'll eat cat food while in human form."

Leaning over, Pomona asked with a smirk, "Atlas, dirigible plum?"

"Oh yes. If you don't believe me, you can check my work," he replied, holding forth his calculations.

***********************************

Albus suspected Barty's job was getting the better of him. Bellatrix Lestrange's death … well, Barty giggled. There was an unwholesome gleam in his eye as he licked his lips nervously and explained, "Don't you see, Dumbledore? They're turning on each other. It's desperation. All I did was put a little pressure on them when the Black family tried to take possession of the Lestrange vault at Gringotts. Get Bellatrix in here to answer questions. Her sister was questioned and released. However, the muggles said the blonde hurt no one. It's the dark-haired woman we wanted. Especially if she killed the only two heirs between her and the Lestrange vault."

"How can you question her now?"

"We can't. And now the Blacks get nothing. They're probably the ones that did her in. That whole family is a pack of murdering animals, but I'm not telling you anything, am I? After that boy of theirs used a werewolf on other students. Shocking … and one day, his father in law will not be at the top of the French ministry. He's getting up in years, and that veela wife of his is not exactly making him feel young, if you know what I mean, eh?"

Barty's ability to concentrate on so much at once, and see plots withing plots was frankly terrifying to Albus. What were the talking about again? Oh … "So Bellatrix was wanted for questioning in the deaths of the Lestrange brothers based on eyewitness accounts. Meanwhile, she eluded you, but you caught up to her family trying to make a um, dubious or premature transfer of funds?"

"Dubious? I'll say. I was ready to accuse her of never consummating the marriage, if I had to. Come now. Married five years and nothing? The Lestranges were anxious for heirs, and she scared off every woman that tried to get near the brother-in-law so there would be no legitimate heirs before she finally spit one out. She wasn't inheriting anything without a potion in her cauldron."

"That was a serious miscalculation."

"I couldn't agree more, Dumbledore."

"So the goblins keep it?"

"Oh no. They're bound to dig back as far as they need to … at some time a female Lestrange married someone. Probably a Black anyway. If not, one of the others that don't need it will inherit. You know how tangled up it is. Could even be me, for all I know."

"That's a profession in itself there."

"The amount of paper wasted on books of bloodlines. We're all related somehow."

"Did you read in The Quibbler, oh, maybe last year, that muggleborns are descendants of squibs? The squibs that integrate into muggle society."

"For a supposedly intelligent man, Albus, you believe the queerest things."

***********************************

Lily, Severus and the rest of the first period Potions class waited in the hallway outside the classroom. The ones who attended breakfast had seen Slughorn at the Head Table. A couple knocked on his office, and Wilkes had tried the door to his quarters. He was standing them up.

Now, they were simply waiting for consensus to leave. NEWTs Potions was a bright group, they all had work they could be doing for their other classes, rather than watching the breath steam out of each other's noses in this frigid, stone hallway without the benefit of cauldron flames to warm their hands.

Lily was standing immediately in front of Sev, and had her hands in his school robes, pulling them forward to keep her warmer. She was not as acclimated as the Slytherins to the dungeons' chill.

There were occasion dissatisfied mutters and the snapping open of pocket watches with disapproving shakes of heads before they were clicked shut.

From her perch on Sev's shouder, Lily could almost swear Phi croaked, "Oh no."

Prof. Slughorn was strolling towards them from the stairs. "What are you lot waiting for?"

"You, sir," Wilkes replied. Slughorn lived on his past glories so much, he had lost his golden touch. For someone that was supposedly good at ferreting out hidden talents and gems of students, the best he could do out of the whole school was Dirk Cresswell?

Looking at his watch, he declared, "Class is canceled."

The Ravenclaws weren't the only one crossing their arms or putting their hands on their hips indignantly, but Prof. Flitwick was going to get an earful about it, whereas Professors McGonagall and Sprout would be spared.

They did not disperse immediately so were treated to Prof. Slughorn screaming in his office, before they got out of earshot. Most slowed down, and Slughorn came running down the hall at them. It was not a pretty sight. He huffed through his mustache for a moment before wheezing out, "Which of you did it?"

Rosier replied, "I knocked on your door. It was closed and the light was off."

"I was with him."

"Me too," added a Ravenclaw prefect.

"Someone broke into my office."

"No one came down the hall in either direction while we were here, sir," Wilkes stated.

Thinking on it for a moment, the wards were untouched. Slughorn turned and headed back towards his office, suspecting Peeves. If nothing was missing, definitely Peeves. The Baron would rat him out.

"What do you think, Sev?"

"Who cares?" Severus replied.

Actually, Lily did not. Let someone steal all Slughorn's candy, and the whole school knew he kept liquor in his office. "So it's Runes next?"

"Yes," he replied as they broke away from the others who were mostly heading for the library.

"Um … yesterday … can I ask?"

"I'm not ready yet, Lily. Maybe after I write things down."

"Write?"

"I'm unclear on facts. I'd rather be upset and angry about the preventable elements."

"Preventable, Sev?"

"My mother was not dead long. I calculated she died in the early morning, just in time to make the paper or a couple hours before."

Lily panicked and explained, "I didn't tell my parents that she was uh ..."

"No, not them, Lily. My mother wouldn't have answered the door, even if they went round."

"Who then?"

"I could open the door, if someone bothered to tell me anything. I'm not exactly sure who should have. If Death Eaters were involved, what about the Ministry? Don't they bother telling families of victims? And isn't there any measures in place at the school for students' families? They got magic quills doing other things. Death of students' parents might be important, rather than shove them on a train in June to abandon them at King's Cross? I have the feeling if it were another student, things might have been handled differently."

That was a possibility, but fraught with trouble. Lily changed the subject slightly with, "You were back so fast."

"If I didn't come back with Prof. Sprout, where was I to go?"

"Um … ," she took a deep breath to think. Her house? If he banged on the door, Lily guessed her mum would let him in, but that would be rather unusual. After a couple days or a week there or anywhere else, Severus would still need some way to get back here, other than illegal apparating. She muttered, "You shouldn't have to go to class for a bit."

"What else do I have to do? Lay around crying? That'll go over real well in my dormitory."

"Hex 'em with that river of snot thing."

"That's not mine. Sorry, Lily."

"And here I was trying to trick you into owning up to that one."

Severus shrugged.

"Weren't there things to arrange?"

"I think there should have been, but Prof. Sprout … I don't know. She didn't need to bring me home so I … I just don't know. I'm hoping that we'll take our apparition test before Easter break, then I can go home and pack up the books after I look through them. I have some paperwork from my parents' bedroom, but we don't have objects d'art or heirlooms. It'll give me something to do while you are doing wedding stuff with Petunia."

Lily did not want to come out and clarify what she meant by arrangements, but weren't there two bodies that needed funerals, caskets and a cemetery? Or did he mean that Prof. Sprout did something to … get rid of them? With Severus knowing next to nothing about weddings, other than the Ministry charges five galleons for a license, his knowledge of funerals could also be lacking.

***********************************

Albus returned to Hogwarts with the feeling that they were winning the war against Tom, but dissatisfied that there was not some decisive victory. It could be his inner Gryffindor speaking, but until Tom was captured or killed, he or his unknown agents could still perform some desperate act. There could still be students within the school that were as solidly his as Sirius Black or Peter Pettigrew. Albus had still held out hope for James Potter, but the attack on that pub had pretty much closed the door on Potter.

His floo flared. Horace asked, "Albus?"

"Yes?"

"Tread carefully, Albus. They are all against us."

"Who?"

"The staff. They've gone insane."

Albus looked around his office at the portraits. If there was some sort of staff mutiny in progress, they would have given him some warning. Phineas Nigellus Black raised an eyebrow and then shrugged. "Really, Horace?"

"I think we can regain the men. They're scared of the women, you know."

Dilys Derwent's portrait snickered. Men!

"What brought this on?"

"Minerva's got ideas, Albus."

"Well, I'll see what I can do, old friend. Don't worry about me," Albus replied, ending the connection with a wave of his hand. Sighing, he knew exactly what happened. Horace tried to suggest what he should not do, or what Minerva should be doing and well … Albus had been in the middle of that enough times.

His shoulders sagged. He meant to ask Horace about Severus Snape. Dinner was only a few short hours away. Albus did not want to floo him back. He'd never get Horace to stop talking, and he had so much to catch up on here.

Minerva entered his office after he had sorted his mail into piles, and asked, "Weren't you supposed to return by lunch?"

"I went back and got involved with discussions regarding Bellatrix Lestrange."

Albus did not like the way Minerva was narrowing her eyes at him. She quietly, but dangerously, asked, "Will her untimely, and most unfortunate, demise interfere with your social calendar also?"

"I doubt it, Minerva."

"I waited for your return to discuss a serious matter with you. Are you in favor of the male students possessing and openly displaying pornographic photographs?"

"You say openly displaying? In what way?"

"Any way. We have a serious problem with male students attacking female students in the school. Don't you agree?"

"Absolutely."

"I propose we go through each of the male dormitories, starting with Slytherin. I walked through Gryffindor's rooms yesterday. No one has anything obviously on display, but Slytherin is shocking."

Unable to help himself, Albus repeated, "Shocking?"

"As in appalling, Albus. And I request trunks be opened. Someone tipped me off that less tame items are secreted away."

"Less tame than appalling?"

"I only saw the shocking and appalling with my own eyes posted proudly on the walls."

"You saw … oh, well than I trust your judgment, Minerva."

"It'll curl your beard."

"Oh dear."

"I think Horace should call the house together for a meeting, without saying what's happening."

"Slytherin first?"

"It's definitely a problem in that house, and we don't want to give them warning to hide it. If I hadn't seen it for myself, I would not be so insistent."

"After dinner?"

Minerva nodded, adding, "But please don't let Horace know, or he'll tip off his favorites. By the way, any chance of expulsions, Albus?"

"Is it that bad?"

"I'm just trying to gauge your 'boys will be boys' attitude in advance. Some of the images I saw were violent."

"Expulsion without a warning is rather sticky, especially if Horace was allowing it to flourish. Suspensions and detentions? Depending on the … severity of the imagery?"

"Detention? We still have those at Hogwarts? Horace dismisses the students after a few minutes."

"I see," Albus replied. No wonder why Horace tried to reach him first. "Oh by the way, Severus Sn ..."

Minerva's nostrils flaring were his cue to allow her interruption. "Pomona assisted him. I would have taken him myself, but with you away …" She took a deep breath and continued, "You should make time to talk to her. Something needs to be done. Pomona was there, so I'd rather you talk to her."

"Horace couldn't ..."

"Horace? Too busy sleeping off a hangover to do … squat. Probably would have directed Mr. Snape to the Hogsmeade train station, if he did anything at all."

"Minerva, that's a rather harsh thing to suggest."

"Suggest? Open your eyes, Albus. Horace can't stand him."

"No, the three of us have had tea up here twice this year."

"Really? I'd like to see that. Perhaps you could invite me to the next one, so I could see it with my own eyes?"

"Surely. Miss Evans was at the last one, it was the four of us actually."

"Miss Evans? Prof. Slughorn judges her association with Mr. Snape has ruined her future so she is no longer one of his favorites. I'm sure she'll be more than willing to tell me what really went on at that chummy tea of yours."

"Are you grinding an axe for Horace, Minerva?"

"Perhaps I tire of his favoritism while ignoring or avoiding other students. He's a head of house, Albus, and he ignores his responsibilities to many of them, while showering his favorites with false praise. Horace also teaches a class where accidents can occur. Do I need to remind you what students from 'better' families are allowed to get away with in a class he is supervising?"

"It happened while Horace's attention was diverted."

"If a student was set on fire in my classroom while I was in it, do you think something else could divert my attention?"

Within his frame, Phineas winced. This could be the ignominious end of Albus Dumbledore.

"Of course not, Minerva. Not everyone is as competent as you."

"Albus, Hogwarts standards and the expectations are being lowered. Do you think we are truly doing a decent job educating and protecting all our students? I'm not even suggesting a good job, just that we attempt to attain decent."

"You see it otherwise?"

Slumping in disbelief, Minerva chided, "Albus, how can you even ask that? Are you absent from the school that much that you have no concept of what goes on here?"

"I supposed you are taking the first step towards opening my eyes tonight. I would like the female students to be able to move through our hallways unmolested."

"Just be sure to remember them when Horace spins some wild tale over his conquests of the fairer sex and tries to get you reminiscing about the good old days, when the two of you had any witch in Europe for the asking."

"Minerva! I never … I'm interested in a woman's mind."

She wagged her finger at him, "Not from what Horace has to say. Don't expect me to fall for beautiful eye comments or that these photographs are art."

Albus was speechless. What did Horace say? Any witch in Europe? Nothing could be further from the truth. Albus … well, he had loved and lost, and was not ready to love again after such pain. Maybe one day, but the chance of lightning striking him twice in one lifetime was unlikely.

***********************************

Rita lay back in her bath, sucked some smoke from her pipe, savored it before exhaling, and simply felt that life was good. Really good.

Normally, she would not count herself among those old vulture witches, who eagerly read the obituaries each day to find a name they knew to laugh themselves silly with a 'better her than me' attitude while only having a herd of cats for company.

Bellatrix Black was dead. Dead. Not even thirty yet. And she didn't even leave a beautiful corpse behind. All manner of accusations had been carved into the flesh of the pieces that had been found so far. Couldn't have happened to a better person.

She blew some smoke rings, cubes and pyramids reminiscing over how much she hated Bellatrix Black. Hogwarts' grudges could last a lifetime.

***********************************

The Slytherins gathered in their common room for this house meeting. None of them expected anything beneficial to occur. Slughorn was probably going on a trip with Cresswell and a couple other of his gift-giving toadies, and was going to nominate some of them to proctor his classes. Hopefully, they'd take Dumbledore with them. Their parents were absolutely right, he was the worst thing to ever happen to this school. The man was a complete boob. Probably got the drop on Grindelwald while he was in the loo.

Severus was seated with the younger boys, assisting with their homework. He needed the library for his so he hoped whatever Slughorn had to say was short, and he didn't get sidetracked with one of his asinine stories about someone else's greatness.

Slughorn entered through their regular entrance, rather than his own, and Dumbledore and McGonagall were with him. She was carrying a clipboard with an inkwell and already had her quill poised. Maybe Slughorn was going somewhere.

Their head told them to be quiet, even though they were not talking loudly. Dumbledore made an announcement, "With the time this may take, you will all have homework that is due tomorrow waived till the following class." If he expected cheers and applause, they did not occur. They weren't mindless Gryffindors failing to see that they could get more homework assigned tomorrow, and have twice as much due. Since when did Albus Dumbledore do them any favors?

McGonagall called the names of the seventh year girls, and they all went with Dumbledore into the hall that led to the girls' rooms, while McGonagall remained behind. When someone did not remain quiet, she took points.

Dumbledore returned alone, and the sixth year girls were called and so on.

Slughorn did not look nervous in the slightest. In fact, he looked rather smug. Dumbledore already told him they were trying to uncover who was casting those jinxes on the girls, now that the Marauders were gone. Minerva was not going to find that lad in Slytherin. He'd definitely be one of her Gryffindors.

The headmaster took longer with the seventh year boys, but he eventually returned.

"Wilkes, Avery, Mulciber, Rosier, Snape."

Since the other four were closer to the boys' corridor, Slughorn took advantage of him being in the far corner to yell, "Stop lagging, Snape."

Dumbledore turned to look at him. What now? Did he really think he chose that seat tonight of all nights to waste his precious time? If he thought he should break into an undignified run across Slytherin, Severus could only hope he decided to hold his breath, turned blue and passed out. Perhaps he had candy in his mouth, and he'd choke on it.

The other sixth years were waiting with Dumbledore. When he joined them, Albus said, "Severus, you are here."

Severus looked at the others. Where was he supposed to be, or was he making some joke about him sitting far away? No one was laughing.

"I heard about your father while I was at the Ministry."

There was a sudden stabbing pain in his chest, and Severus momentarily stopped walking with them down the spiraling corridor deeper beneath the castle. He resumed after his right knee tried to resist the command to march on. With ice flowing through his veins, Severus conversationally inquired, "Oh, when was that?"

"Oh, three or four days ago. I'm surprised you are already back at school."

He didn't know? Who … Severus asked, "Didn't you contact Professor …?" He let his question hang. Who? Who did nothing while his mother died?

"Hm, who? Prof. Sprout?"

"No, I meant when you first heard." Severus knew Dumbledore did not floo Sprout. She wouldn't let days pass and do nothing.

"Oh, I was at the Ministry, my boy. I'm sorry I couldn't express my condolences sooner, but I was needed there."

They entered their dormitory with Severus trying to bore a hole through the back of Dumbledore's head with his stare. He knew days ago, in a place full of floo grates, and probably a huge flocks of owls, and did nothing?

"Why don't all of you take a seat upon your trunks?"

Severus sat like the others, thinking. Whoever at the Ministry tells Dumbledore … and then Dumbledore does nothing? His father's a muggle. The muggle police weren't going to find him at Hogwarts to notify him, and his mother never opened the door for anyone to expect her to know anything. Even if she did know, what would she have done? Maybe once it got dark, and light, and dark again, she might have registered that father was not returning. She was sensible enough to put fuel in the stove, till it was completely gone.

Dumbledore flicked his wand and their bed curtains opened. Phi associated that with getting fed, and went to her bowls.

"Mr. Mulciber, could you please open your trunk?"

Oh, now Severus knew why they were here. So if McGonagall was not coming down hard on Mulciber's collection of graphically violent porn, it may have been weeks before Dumbledore thought to say something to him, if at all.

***********************************

After a long evening of going through all four dormitories, Albus was knackered. They'd have a staff meeting tomorrow. Shocking and appalling were only two words that Minerva could use to describe what was found. Slytherin, especially Mr. Mulciber's collection, was the worst and most tasteless. Lads from the other three houses were not innocent either. Neither were a handful of young ladies.

His fellow headmasters started waxing poetic about the antics that students used to get up to, until Albus showed them the finest examples of what he confiscated from Slytherin.

Phineas Nigellus commented, "Back in my day, a wizard would have to go to Singapore to see talent of that caliber."

***********************************

During and after detention, Severus' mind was full of ideas. Each wilder and more painful. The sorts of things he used to reserve for daydreaming about Sirius Black and James Potter.

Once he lay down, his mind circled back to Lily. She certainly would not be an accomplice. Lily thought the Ministry did a good job. She liked Dumbledore. But his mother? No, she'd like Dumbledore more than his mother. Certainly enough to rationalize insignificant details being forgotten when the Ministry and Dumbledore were doing important work. It's not like his mother was important. Severus certainly knew he was not important. Better not to mention it to Lily at all. She would only tell him how wrong he was. Wasn't it Lily who predicted something great would happen to him in February? Maybe from her point of view the deaths of both his parents was terrific.

***********************************

Minerva spent most of the staff meeting looking at Albus with that 'told you so' look in her eyes, every time Horace objected because lads always had a couple of racy photos, and it never harmed anyone before.

As the meeting was breaking up, Pomona caught his eye, but Horace threw his arm around his shoulders and tried to steer him out of the room, "Ah, Albus. Giving in to them. What's happened to your backbone? I remember when … what do you need, Pomona? Can't you see Albus and I have things to discuss?"

"I also have things to discuss with him, Horace," she said through gritted teeth.

"We know its cold, and your greenhouses blah, blah, blah. Can't Hagrid help you out?"

"He does, and that's not what I need to speak to the headmaster regarding. Actually, you may want to join us."

Horace removed his arm from Dumbledore, held up his hands and said, "Hey, I don't butt in when you two are talking about knitting patterns, so you need to give me a chance to catch up with Albus too. He'd been gone for days, and this is the first real chance I've gotten ..."

"Oh, I see. So that's the way it's going to be. Is it?" she asked, looking between the two of them.

Horace sighed, "Hufflepuffs."

"Hufflepuffs? I hope this comes back to bite you in the arse so hard, your legs drop off, Horace." Literally shaking with rage, she added, "And you too, Albus. Good day."

"Pomona!" Albus called after her. She was truly upset over something.

"Eh, let her go, Albus. It's nothing a cup of tea and a couple hugs won't solve."

***********************************

Lily was perplexed. They were allowed to go to Hogsmeade for Valentine's Day, but the cold showed little sign of letting up. Severus said he did not care whether they went or not, but if Lily wanted to go, he'd go with her. The only thing making her somewhat happy was Severus was now totally ignoring Mary, and was no longer even answering her questions through Lily. Right now though, Severus should be depending on his friends, rather than excluding them.

They had not shagged since he went home. Lily kept her hands off his penis, but held his hand and put her arms around him. At times, when they were sitting quietly together in the evening, Severus would become overcome with emotion, but he was not talking about his feelings. Lily could guess how he felt, but wished he would say something.

***********************************

AN: Has no one figured out that these muggles lie? Or do they simply refuse to admit that muggles could possibly kill two wizards?

AN: The generally accepted US and UK pronunciation of phi is fi, like fly or Phi Beta Kappa. The proper Greek pronunciation is fee, and the letter pi is pronounced as pee.


	37. Chapter 37 So Many Deaths

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 37 So Many Deaths

Lily woke up smelling … something not bad. Grrr. It would have helped if someone didn't put two roses in the middle of her pillow while she was sleeping on it. She fussed at the white and red rose, trying to fix what she mangled by rolling over them with her face. Jeez! Maybe when they opened up more, no one would notice she messed them up.

It didn't help that she also kicked while she slept, and the sea of white lilies on the covers were strewn every which way. She knew it was that sneaky Severus that got these in here somehow, without finally noticing there was some fancy squiggly thing on the ribbon holding the two roses together. If she tried to make it out, it could be a capital L in script that looped into a S.

Sneak probably arranged for February 14th to fall on a Monday this year too. How dare he do this ambush thing on her, when Lily did not have anything in mind till Saturday, even if they didn't go to Hogsmeade. Well, she didn't have anything firm in mind for Saturday because of Sev's parents. He wasn't himself yet, and might not be for a long time. Not that getting flowers onto her bed was like him either.

She was thinking why would he choose white lilies, unless he knew they would look nice against the red bed? Mary interrupted her thoughts, "Who's trying to get into your knickers?"

Frowning at her roommate, Lily said, "That's not a very nice thing to say." If some random boy sent her a bunch of flowers, she wouldn't let him have his way with her.

"How else is someone going to get in them? You got your legs sealed together with a permanent sticking charm."

Lily screeched as she hopped out of bed. Mary was ruining what should have been a … a very nice moment of thinking about how Severus feels about her. "They are not, and these flowers are from Severus."

"Severus?"

"Yes."

"Are you sure, Lily?"

"Of course."

"Why?"

"Well, I told you that we're … sort of getting closer."

Mary's eyes widened, and accusingly she spit, "You … you gave him a pity shag?"

"What?"

"You know. Taking advantage of him like this now. That's low."

"I did not."

"These are flowers of friendship, and you have never shagged him, you're saying?"

"No."

"You felt sorry for him and did it, didn't you? Lily … that's so wrong."

"I wasn't feeling sorry for him, and it's not wrong."

"Oh … so his parents die, he's upset, and his snake happens to accidentally slither between your legs while you're comforting him?"

"No, it wasn't like that at all. We've done it before that."

"No, you didn't, Lily. You told me you kissed Severus over the break. It's because you're jealous of me, isn't it? Figured that would make you the winner, and you were sitting there all smug because you got him thinking he loves you."

"No, I'm … what are you talking about?"

"Flowers. Flowers? Come on. That's it right there. He wouldn't have showered you with flowers unless you made him think you cared for him."

"I do care for him."

"If you cared for him, you wouldn't choose now to throw yourself on him."

"I didn't wait till now."

"Oh really? Well, I looked at your Wizarding card over there, and that's from a friend, not a lover."

Lily was tempted to describe a ballpoint pen as a special muggle device for sexual purposes, but Mary might repeat it in Muggle Studies and then all of Hogwarts' inbred idiots would think that. "We're both. I got to get ready. I don't have time to listen to your nonsense."

"We'll see about that."

Exiting, Lily childishly replied, "Not listening."

*****************************************************

Mary's raving got Lily thinking about shagging. Not the pulsing need that drove her to molest Severus, but questioning herself on how that got turned off. Of course, this was the proper time not to be grabbing the front of Sev's trousers and unzipping him whenever she got him alone, but could it be that her mind finally overcame her body? This was good, Lily had been wondering what was going to happen to her grades since she'd rather shag than study, and frankly wanted more shagging. Lots more shagging. The scary question was would there be any more shagging?

That question weighed on Lily so heavily, she did not even try to disguise what she meant when she got to Severus in Transfiguration. "Do you still want to shag me, Sev?"

Severus glanced around since students entering the room passed their location in the back. "Why would you think that? I've been self-absorbed but I know you … You're important, Lily. I tried to show you that with the flowers. They didn't mean something else."

"Oh, right. Thanks for the flowers. So … I know that you've got a lot to think about. I'm not complaining or demanding you … I don't know. I don't want to sound like a total jerk."

"Can it wait till this evening for me to shag you or you'll die?"

"Oh no, I mean I don't mean no as in no, uh, I can wait."

Severus made a confused face at her, then leaned close and teased her with a low, sexy voice, "The powerful witch, Lily the Libidinous, could be rendered incapable of normal speech if she did not have the seed of young wizards liberally applied to her body daily."

"The what?"

"Li bid i nous from the Latin libido."

"That doesn't sound hot."

"If it was Lusty Lily, you would be serving drinks at the Hog's Head."

She laughed, then whispered to him naughtily, "My favorite young wizard is Severus the Slytherin Sex God."

Severus thought he was more like a Sex Object, rather than the Sex God. "No one would believe it without proof. I've chosen Severus the Slimy as my dark wizard moniker."

"Why slimy?"

"It will be an easy transition from slimy Slytherin for those that already acknowledge me, and I'd rather choose that title than end up stuck with Stinky or Smelly."

Lily shook with more laughter. People did not call him slimy Slytherin because they 'acknowledged' him. They weren't very original either. Even with all that was going on with Severus, his hair was still washed.

After class, Lily remembered to tell Severus as she walked along with him, "Mary knows about us."

"Alright."

"She's angry."

"I recall predicting that."

"You're not understanding, Sev."

"She's sworn some terrible Gryffindor revenge on the two of us? And since it's Gryffindor, gave you full warning, and may tell you everything she plans to do, before she does it?"

"Noooooo, Sev. This is serious."

"She has a Slytherin assisting her?"

She snapped, "No. She's mad at me for taking advantage of you."

"Aren't we both seventeen?"

"Right. She meant something else because she only found out now."

"Huh? All I know is you invited me into a bathroom, suggested I needed a bath and then I don't know what you did … I feel like you stole my innocence, Lily," he said with a smirk.

"Don't be a toerag."

"And how do I end up as the toerag?"

"You're not. She is. Mary's up to something."

"I'll head the other way if she suggests I join her in the ladies'. I've learned my lesson."

Lily rolled her eyes at him, and allowed Severus to go into Runes.

*****************************************************

James Potter was starting to think someone had cursed him, rather than a year of terrible bad luck. His parents had changed their mind, and now he was going to be home schooled by them until they felt he was ready to take his NEWTs. They canceled his transfer to Beauxbatons. Not that James had been keen to go to France, but even the French were preferable to his parents. There was also the slim hope that he'd see Sirius. Stupid berk didn't even send him holiday greetings or reply to his. Best mates forever? Sirius Black was exactly like the rest of his disgusting family. Probably lied to him from the moment the hat said "Gryffindor".

At least Remus wrote back through his parents. His letters to James were so depressing. James knew that Azkaban was not pleasant, and was intentionally designed to punish the convicts within its walls. Perhaps there was some way to get Remus freed. An appeal due to … well, due to it solely being Sirius' fault. Unlikely due to the Black family's influence and wealth, but James felt this was not Remus' fault. Whoever thought it was a good idea to keep him in the Shrieking Shack anyway? If a couple of students could find him, meaning James, Sirius and Peter, it was likely others would stumble upon Remus during his monthly transformations over seven years. There wasn't even a silencing spell on the Shack.

Now that he was home again after his father and solicitor got him away from the Ministry with their stupid questions about Dark Arts, Death Eaters and attacking muggles, James had another worthless and wandless lesson. Character building. Merlin's balls was he sick of hearing that from his parents. He had tons of character. Till now, James had been the most popular student at Hogwarts. Instead of playing quidditch like he should be doing, his parents found stacks of books and assigned him to define every muggle term in these stupid obituaries. If the Lestranges weren't already dead, James would be on the hunt for them to force them to do this worthless assignment.

It was a complete waste of time. James didn't need to know what this crap meant. It was no surprise to him that Snape's father was real good at being a sneaky bastard that overcame obstacles on land and on sea to get to unexpected places to kill and destroy things. His son was an ugly cockroach too.

James would be seventeen in March. Although he loved his parents, James was considering striking out on his own and making a go of it. Try out for a quidditch team to give him something to occupy his time. His dream of becoming an auror was gone. Was Sirius laughing at him every time they discussed becoming aurors together? One of the Dark Arts-loving Blacks an auror? Only to cover up for the rest of his foul family.

*****************************************************

Severus surprised Lily with kissing, slow snogging and love making after they left the library that evening. Not exactly a surprise since it was Valentine's Day, but quite nice. Well, more than nice.

"Not tomorrow morning, Lily. I'm not sleeping well."

"Oh, that's alright, Sev. Is it something in particular?"

He sighed against her shoulder, and muttered, "I should probably look through what I took from the house. That would be more useful, but I keep thinking about my mother."

"Of course you do," Lily replied supportively.

"What if she knew ..." he suggested with a shuddering indrawn breath.

"Knew?"

"My father was not coming back, and I was not going to help her."

"You? But … you would help her, if you knew."

"She would not know that."

Lily blinked quickly to try to stop tears. It was little wonder Severus couldn't sleep with such negative thoughts in his head. "She went to Hogwarts, Sev. She knew how isolated it is here."

"Maybe," he responded, shifting against her. He lowered his head further and confessed, "It doesn't excuse the ones that did know, and couldn't be bothered saying anything till it was too late."

Slughorn? Who else held Sev in such little regard? How did Sev know? Slughorn wasn't the type to admit a mistake. Lily's curiosity overcame her, and she asked, "How would someone know? Your father was not in the Prophet."

"The Ministry investigated the Death Eaters. They knew, probably from last summer, but Dumbledore was told. He was told about my father, while he was at the Ministry. Days before my mother died. He told me, and told me he was too busy. The Ministry's lobby is full of floo grates."

"Floo you?"

"No, I wouldn't expect him to floo me or come back here, but you think he can't floo any of the teachers up here?"

"Um ..."

"Lily, how fast was Flitwick at St. Mungo's? They flooed the school when we showed up after the werewolf attack. I bet they didn't just try one floo call and give up, if it was Flitwick either. They kept at it, till someone was on the other side to talk to them."

Although she would prefer not to agree with Severus on this serious matter, his reasoning was convincing. "Yeah, I mean, even if he didn't know your mum uh … needed you. Wouldn't you be expected to go home for a funeral? Why would he think your mum had an owl to write, and if she did, the weather has been rotten for flying. A floo call would be better. Much better. Are you sure he didn't floo someone? I mean Dumbledore … I find it a bit …"

"That's why I asked him."

"Oh. Oh, you … came right out and asked him?"

"He was distracted so he wasn't concentrating on what I was asking."

"Huh? Dumbledore was doing something else?"

"Yes, so in passing, he said he heard about my father. Which was sort of odd, most wizarding types just mention my mother since she was the one in the paper, so that's why I asked some questions and he said he was at the Ministry, they told him, and I asked how long ago. It was the day he got back so I don't think he made a mistake. Mother had only died the day before."

Unattractively, Lily's brow furrowed, she squinted her eyes and crinkled her nose above her open mouth while she processed this piece of information. This had not happened last year or a long time ago, it was only a week ago. Severus said he wanted to get facts, and this was mind-boggling. Wasn't it? Wait, Dumbledore. Of course, it didn't involve afters, a piece of candy and He Who Must Not Be Named, or even his darling Marauders. Though on the other hand, there was always the smidgen of doubt because Severus was Slytherin, and sometimes, he didn't know what was really going on, so it wasn't like Lily was thinking he was intentionally lying. Why would he lie about this anyway, unless he was looking for something to assuage his obvious grief, and the guilt, that Lily didn't know about till tonight, he was feeling over not being there for his mother when she needed him?

Her brain was still sizzling with pros and cons, and theories of what could have happened to give Severus this idea, when he left for detention. How could he … no, Lily knew this was not something he told her to get her riled up, this was something that was bothering him. Severus had told her what was on his mind? His lack of sleep must be undermining his defenses. How was Lily supposed to sleep now? Unlike Severus, she wasn't going to spend nights thinking of all the other possible outcomes of his sad set of circumstances.

*****************************************************

Without risk, there is no gain. The Lestrange vault would be the Blacks because it was rightfully theirs. Although Orion did not call the Dark Lord master, as his close cousin, Cygnus, did, his pruning of the weaker families had benefited them all greatly.

There was one family that was so mentally weak, they deserved to have no future entries in the wizarding bloodlines. Cygnus said his master liked their muscle. Considering that's all a Crabbe consisted of, that wasn't saying much. Unfortunately, the Crabbe family had also been loyal to powerful masters and families in the past. Their craggy, heap of a manor was well-fortified.

Obtaining this family portkey stolen from that very group of dull-witted wizards was paramount to Orion's plan. From his research, only the Crabbes stood between him and that vault. He needed them out of the way before they signed the paperwork from Gringotts, or it would go to their heirs.

Obviously, someone as important and distinguished as Orion Black sent others to run errands, but in a case like this, where any pair of loose lips would have to be permanently sealed, he did not want to lose any of his most trusted lackies. Anyone less than that, he would not have the confidence in to successfully barter for that portkey or trust with this many of his galleons.

Besides, he was Orion Black. He feared nothing, especially not the filth that crawled through Knockturn Alley. So what if it was dark?

*****************************************************

Since the headmaster was apparently not receiving visitors right now, Lily went to Prof. McGonagall. It was close enough to curfew that her head of house had not already donned her notorious tartan dressing gown that no Gryffindor wanted the misfortune of seeing, since it meant rousing her for something unpleasant. Since her office was alight and she was still in her teaching robes, Lily felt it was safe to start a discussion.

"Professor, I guess you already realize I'm friends with Severus Snape."

"I've noticed, Evans."

"Well, with um, what happened, he's not well. He's not sleeping, and Severus thinks Prof. Dumbledore told him … something really terrible."

"Terrible?"

"Nothing can be done about it now, but uh … Severus thinks about it. What the headmaster said, and about his mother," Lily blinked as her eyes started to water.

Minerva knew Miss Evans was intentionally being vague, but doubted she meant Albus Dumbledore and Mrs. Snape had any AND between them. "Perhaps you could explain it to me?"

"Well, um … oh, maybe I should give you a little history of uh … this. Sev's mum, she uh … didn't go outside their house. Maybe the last time was when he needed to get to school the first time."

Pomona had given Minerva and some of the other staff, those willing to listen, a dismal description of the Snape home, but she had no information on the living parents. Pomona was most upset that she could not aid Severus more, and she described herself as shocked into motionless by what she saw. Unlike others, Minerva did not equate Hufflepuff with weak, so she knew whatever Pomona tried to describe to them in words must have been truly tragic.

When Prof. McGonagall nodded at her, Lily continued, "So last summer, when Potter and Black attacked that pub, that's why Mr. Snape told Severus to try to fix things and he got in trouble for underaged magic because his mum couldn't … and Sev was really angry with the Ministry fellow because he asked about her, but she shouldn't have to be responsible for fixing what Potter and Black did."

"Was that the same pub the Death Eaters attacked?"

"Yes, and I don't know why they would because there's got to be lots of better places for them to make their statement or to get noticed. So the Death Eaters killed some of the fellows in there, and one of them is Severus' father. Then the Ministry's involved because it's Death Eaters. They know Mr. Snape from the last time. Right, professor?" Lily asked, desperate for validation or denial.

"Of course." They should never have let those boys back into school in September. She did not agree with Albus about Lupin either, but he would have been so much safer without others knowing his secret, and using him, supposedly their own friend, to settle their schoolboy grudges.

"What would they normally do?"

"Do about what?"

"About the victim or their family? Severus said there were a bunch of them at the pub when it was smashed up by Potter and Black. So at least that many would go and put together their report, and … question people? But they'd have to be in disguise I guess, but they could speak to Severus openly. He wasn't there this time, and got there afterwards last time, but he might know something."

"That's a possibility, but it would be up to the Headmaster or Prof. Slughorn."

"I hadn't thought of that. Ooh, so now it's making a bit more sense. So if Prof. Dumbledore is at the Ministry, it would be simple for them to tell him of the situation," Lily's thinking aloud came to a halt.

"Has this resolved the terrible situation, Miss Evans?"

"Hardly. Severus' mum is at home without his father to take care of her. She's alone, and Sev said she won't answer the door so if one of the muggles went round to check on her, including my parents. Sev seems to think only he or his father can get in the house.

"So the Ministry knows and tells Dumbledore ..."

Minerva's mind was already a couple steps ahead of Lily now so she totally missed correcting her on omitting the headmaster's title.

"When he returned to the school, the day after Sev's mum died, Severus said that the headmaster told him that he knew of his father's death while he was at the Ministry days before, but was too busy to do anything."

Disbelievingly, Minerva asked, "Why would he say something like that to Mr. Snape?"

"Severus said he was distracted, and the headmaster didn't say it like that, but he answered Sev's questions without paying attention to what he was being asked. And Sev says there's plenty of floos at the Ministry so he could floo someone here at the school on his way past, and wouldn't have to stop whatever was keeping him tied up down there."

He must have been pretty distracted if he thought a Slytherin asking questions was just making conversation, Minerva mused.

"I know it can't be fixed now, but there's got to be something else that was missed. I mean, Sev isn't the only one that lives in a muggle house. None of us muggleborns have owls at home so if something happens to one or both of our parents, or even my sister, how do we find out? I mean Severus said the school wouldn't put a student on the train in June to let them sort it on their own, but is that what really happens? They are left standing in King's Cross? Well, other than students that are supposed to be left alone like Sev. No one picks him up, he gets on a muggle train like my family."

"It depends, Miss Evans. There's a number of magical devices operating to assist the staff. If your sister was in an accident, I would have no idea. However, if there was a change to your legal guardians or that change resulted in a change of residence for you, I'd be aware of it."

"You would? But ..."

"For Gryffindor, I would be alerted to the change in legal guardians. The residence is transparent, since it is part of the records that the letter writing quills use, mostly over the summer holiday for acceptance letters and required reading."

"Should Prof. Slughorn have noticed something?"

"Perhaps. Mr. Snape is seventeen, so either his guardianship may have changed on his birthday, or afterwards, but the reason would be considered he turned seventeen."

When Miss Evans fell into quiet thought again, Minerva consoled her, "If Prof. Dumbledore knew of the importance of him getting a message to Mr. Snape, I'm sure he would have made every effort."

"Importance? Even if his mum didn't need immediate care, shouldn't he at least be allowed to go home for his father's funeral?"

"He should have, but I doubt the headmaster considered that there was no other means for notifying him."

"That's of little reassurance to Severus. He can't sleep because he's been wondering for the past week how his mother suffered while waiting for him." This time Lily couldn't stop the tears from flowing, and was rather unladylike, even after Minerva handed her a handkerchief.

"Is Severus down in Slytherin now?"

"No, he's somewhere working for Mr. Filch."

"Mr. Filch?"

"His detention."

"I'm sure once I explain to Mr. Filch, he won't mind if I take Severus to the Infirmary."

"The Infirmary?"

"Yes, Madam Pomfrey can prescribe a sleeping draft."

Lily snorted, and a glimmer of vindication nudged her to elaborate. "I doubt it. The last time he set foot in there, he ended up with detention for life, and he wasn't even a patient. The two of us were visiting Mary MacDonald, and we were very well behaved. It's not like Sev was jumping from bed to bed, messing the linens. He was sitting next to me in a chair, speaking quietly with us."

This struck Minerva as untrue. However, something was unresolved regarding this 'detention for life'. If Severus Snape had committed some atrocity to deserve it, what was it, especially when Horace didn't proclaim it to save himself the extra duty of proctoring detentions?

"I can remain with Mr. Snape while he is being examined."

"What kind of examined?" Lily asked, suddenly afraid that she was reopening the real can of worms with Pomfrey.

"Madam Pomfrey will need to have some questions answered before she starts giving out potions."

"Oh, right, I …," seeing Prof. McGonagall's doubting look, she decided to come sort of clean, "I don't want Severus getting more upset. At St. Mungo's, he hated whenever they touched him. He's very self-conscious about his person."

"Lack of sleep after such a personal tragedy is understandable. I doubt he will be asked to do anything undignified, Lily. However, I'll keep that in mind while I'm accompanying him."

*****************************************************

Minerva found Severus where Argus said he'd be, but he was laying face down on the floor as she turned the corner. His bird made a noise and swooped towards her, and he rolled over with his wand pointed towards her. He lowered it, and greeted her, "Professor."

"What are you doing on the floor, Mr. Snape?"

"There's cold air coming through here. It's an interior castle wall so I'm seeing if I can figure if this is related to the drafts that I've found elsewhere because it would be more efficient to seal one source, rather than all these holes."

What the heck did Argus have him doing? Severus had a stack of parchment with him, and was jotting down some notes now. If Argus was not so pleased with his work, she'd think he was doing something else. "I talked to Mr. Filch. You can complete this tomorrow. Please come with me to the Infirmary."

"What for, professor?"

"You don't look well, Mr. Snape," she replied. He did not look well, and it wasn't simply the clothes he wore when he was crawling on the floor for Argus. Normally he did not look healthy. His hair had been uncharacteristically clean, but he had deep shadows under his eyes.

"I'm fine, professor."

"I'd rather you come with me anyway to answer some questions for Madam Pomfrey. She's concerned about you."

Severus muttered, "I doubt that," but gathered his items together.

Minerva heard him. Considering how many hours of detention he had served so far for the matron that was rather mild.

She asked Severus to have a seat when they reached the Infirmary. Poppy did not know she was bringing a patient up, in spite of what she led Severus to believe.

Closing the office door behind her, Minerva said, "Poppy, I brought Severus Snape up to see you. He lost both his parents and is not handling it well."

"I had heard, Minerva. Should he even be at school?"

"He has nowhere else to go."

"Pomona mentioned something about it," Poppy replied.

"Severus is disturbed because his mother may have starved to death, or something else drawn out and painful."

"Hmm, Pomona had asked me. I have no idea without more information."

"In any case, Severus seems to think so."

"Will he even cooperate? He's a headstrong boy."

"Cooperate with what, Poppy? Taking a sleeping potion? That's the immediate problem. He does not sleep. Severus is too much of a thinker."

"I should give him a complete exam, Minerva. He was diagnosed with a number of physical problems at St. Mungo's."

Minerva thought the issue with Severus was prior injuries, not any ongoing conditions. However, Poppy would have discussed with the healers from St. Mungo's, not her. "If it won't take long, Poppy. He looks dead on his feet," Minerva said, exaggerating slightly.

"Let me take a look at him," Poppy said rising, taking out her wand.

Severus was seated in one of the chairs outside the office, rather than on one of the beds, with his head bowed forward, his hair covering his face. Phi was alertly perched on his shoulder.

"Lay down on one of the beds, Snape," Poppy said, torn between helping a student, and who this particular student was. Some Slytherins were nothing but trouble. Why would she doubt Horace's word that this was one of them? Snape certainly proved it so far. However, Poppy did not feel that Snape was a He Who Must Not Be Named caliber Slytherin. That was an evil, dark wizard.

Severus looked at Prof. McGonagall, then complied with Madam Pomfrey's request. At the very least he could give McGonagall the time that he would have been serving detention tonight.

Phi perched on the white enameled brass headboard. She had seen McGonagall enough times now, but did not know this other woman. Her person considered her as potentially harmful to him. There were many in this collection of stone buildings that he felt could possibly prey on him. Her person should take his mate and dwell in a safer place. Phi certainly did not feel safe here.

"The bird is unsanitary."

Severus did not respond. Unsanitary? Was she proposing some sort of surgery? He slept and ate with Phi now. If she had something, he probably already caught it.

"What symptoms do you have?" she asked, while starting to cast standard diagnostic charms.

"I am currently unaffected by any ill-intentioned spells."

"That's not what I meant, Snape."

"None than?"

Poppy sighed. Clearly he was ill. Nothing truly life-threatening. More than lack of sleep. Even trouble-making lads of seventeen would be effected by the loss of one parent. Both certainly sent his mind into a state of shock that he was having difficulty with. Everything – sleeping, eating, socializing, whatever he did would be unmanageable. As she said earlier, he should not be at Hogwarts. With everyone Horace knew, there had to be someplace to put him for a few weeks.

"Are dreams a problem?"

"No, ma'am."

"I'll prescribe simple sleeping draught and a nutrient solution. You should eat a larger variety of foods. You can take the nutrient solution now, and take the sleeping draught with you for later tonight."

"Alright." She wasn't going to poison him in front of McGonagall, or at least he didn't think so.

Later, Severus was back in Slytherin, and was attempting to communicate with Phi. She knew how to make noise to alert him, but he wasn't sure he was expressing that after he drank this potion, he'd be hard to wake. She could also be overcome by anyone meaning him harm. Maybe he should save it for this weekend. If he gave Lily a good round of hard shagging, perhaps she would let him sleep.

Telling Lily earlier tonight what was on his mind did not resolve anything, still he now felt that maybe his sleepness nights could be spent looking at some of the items he brought from home, other than mother's wand.

After correlating the right paperwork together, Severus pondered the muggle concept of life insurance. It surely was a bad idea if a company was trying to make money. Severus knew muggles liked money just as much as wizards. If he was understanding this correctly, a person could wager a small amount of money that they would one day die. Some company accepts that bet at ridiculously good odds, but why would they do that? Everyone dies.

In the long list of amounts deducted from his father's wages, this life insurance was a pittance compared to some of the other penalties his father paid for the privilege of laboring. Contained in the paperwork provided by the employer, there was a description of the deductions and what this life insurance was. Someone could possibly owe him money because his father died, and it was not the result of some court decision due to some part of his father's death being their fault. This insurance company would actually be interested in his father living as long as possible, if they had anyone smart working there, which was doubtful since they bet on people not dying.

By the time Severus began to wonder if his lack of a muggle education gave him a perspective that could make him comfortably wealthy among muggles, there was noise out in the corridor. Slytherins snuck in and out of their rooms all night, even if it was only to use the loo. Usually they were a quiet bunch. Some dunderhead was having a conversation in the midst of the male room hallway. Their downward spiraling corridor had horrible acoustics, so mostly nothing was said, unless someone wanted to start a false and vicious rumor. However, since everyone knew that's why any conversation would happen, anything said was ignored. Hence, no reason to talk out there at … three in the Merlin-loving morning.

It was not long before a cranky Mulciber, who no longer could get in a decent wank because his private reading material was confiscated, got up grumbling, yanked open their door, and shouted into the hall, "Shut the fuck up."

Severus tried to make out the response. It was Slughorn, but it was garbled.

"Right professor, but the time. We got class." Severus rolled his eyes at that. Mulciber needed to rest up for History of Magic?

He lay in bed disappointed that Mulciber closed the door, rather than going berserk on the self-centered git. Whatever Slughorn was doing was 'important', or he would not be up at this time, putting on a show for half his house.

*****************************************************

Albus arrived at breakfast to find the seating had been rearranged. He already knew that Horace was called away due to an emergency, and Hagrid had taken his place on his right. Minerva was sitting at the end of the table in deep discussion with Poppy and Pomona, instead of at his left. That place was occupied by the elderly Prof. Upsilon, who taught Ancient Runes and made little effort to learn more English in all his years teaching at Hogwarts. His years in Scotland had not faded his dark complexion which he renewed without fail every summer in his native Greek isles. Having known him so long, Albus knew that unlike himself, Upsilon had lost noticeable inches in height over the years, but failed to adopt the wizarding custom of compensating with taller hats.

His copy of the paper was neatly folded and waiting for him, but he chose to fix his toast first. Albus already knew the front page story would be regarding the gruesome murder of Orion Black in Knockturn Alley.

"The ancient Greeks were very wise when they wrote their memorable tragedies. It is unwise to try to alter fate. Frequently their plots led to the very thing they were trying to avoid. Do you remember King Laius?" Upsilon asked in Greek.

Albus looked when silence met the question, and realized he was the one that had been asked. "Laius? Oh, I'm afraid I don't," Albus answered in slow English.

"Pity. Big lesson in that one. Multiple prophecies of the same outcome with everyone doing their best to circumvent them. And after all that, Oedipus does kill his father and marries his mother. Never would have happened if people weren't acting like fools."

Next to Hagrid, Silvanus Kettleburn started telling Rubeus the abbreviated tale of Oedipus since after he translated, Hagrid asked, "How does someone manage to do that?" Meaning kill their father and marry their own mother. The plot was fascinating. These Greek chappies could tell a darned good tale.

Albus asked, "You see fools at Hogwarts?" He felt a bit uncomfortable as Upsilon's intelligent, dark eyes brightly studied him. Not everyone agreed with Albus' sense of fashion, but there was no need to be insulting about it.

"Perhaps not. You think you are assisting Fate?"

"In what way?"

"You knew your adversaries when they were young. Gellert Grindelwald and I also had Tom Riddle as a student. Do you intentionally set them on their paths, or is it merely good fortune?"

Albus' mouth puckered as he thought. His ancient Greek was good because Upsilon gave him occasional practice. Keeping his English slow, although he knew the man understood every word said around him, he asked, "Is there a student like that now at Hogwarts?"

"If you asked me sooner, I'd say not. The man I now have in mind had a wicked sense of humor and loved irony then. He also says a lot in his Runes essays that Riddle did not."

"You remember that far back?"

"I remember the other staff praising Riddle's brilliance, and thinking his work was adequate. He was merely learning to translate, not reading the material."

Albus nodded in understanding. "Why would you suggest I had something to do with this change?"

"You manipulate things to your liking, Albus." Switching to Latin, he said, "Memento mori."

"Remember you shall die?"

"Yes," Upsilon agreed in Greek. "You are not young, and still have to deal with Tom. I wouldn't consider it wise to anticipate your next nemesis yet."

"Does my nemesis have a name?"

"I'm fond of Severus, so I'd rather not point him out to you so early in the game."

"Game?" Albus repeated, shocked that Severus Snape could even be considered to be anything like Gellert or Tom. They both had a tangible presence and hordes of admirers. Severus was quiet, avoided people, normally kept to himself but thought about many things. Obviously, he would fight back when provoked, and would get nasty if a group of people continually pushed him. With him being a Slytherin, there had to be some ambition and need to prove himself, but awards seemed worthless to him. Albus would like to think of him as a budding philosopher. His one published work was an essay on government's responsibility to its society. Gellert and Tom wanted to change things through might with themselves in charge. They did not try to sway public opinion by publishing their views.

"Isn't that what your Gryffindor house is known for? Games and winning them at all costs? I don't have many of them as students, so I may be mistaken."

"Slytherin has its share of ruthlessness."

"Oh? I thought it was one of your favorites that used his tragic werewolf friend to kill his rival on the quidditch pitch. That would have played well in Greece centuries ago, but substitute quidditch with a real game, perhaps discus or javelin throwing?"

"No one could foretell how that would turn out."

"Nonsense. The tragic werewolf was purposely placed to allow him to be a huge plot point in any tale. Lupin was my student. Eager to please and willing to follow along in the name of friendship. Any friendship. That's the basis for a good story. Youth and innocence lost. Grieving parents on both sides. Lupin's especially because they have the constant reminder of the terrible decision they made allowing him to attend school here. A costly mistake to share the burden of their son with others, when they should have known only they would have his best interests at heart."

Albus was starting to think the Ancient Runes professor purposely sat here to give him grief. What reason was there to call him to task for? Severus seemed fine, over at the Slytherin table, having breakfast with the younger lads. Albus had noticed this before. He was not sure if Severus was imparting some wisdom to them, or if he simply related better to younger students. His fellows may have matured faster than him, or at least Albus thought so after finding those photos. In all his years, Albus had never even imagined such things, and some of the Wizengamot were dirty old men who were always flashing inappropriate photos to pass the time.

He picked up his newspaper and opened it. Barty had contacted him last night, and Horace took Regulus home. Albus had little idea what was going on. The Black family, as a whole, was involved with too much to make an idle guess why Orion was in Knockturn Alley. Purchasing some rare Dark Arts or illegal item was the likeliest reason, but he could have been visiting the brothel.

*****************************************************

For Potions, they had a substitute teacher. Lily recognized the old man as the Ancient Runes teacher, but until now, she didn't know he didn't teach class in English. Not that he was teaching. Severus translated for her that they were to carry on with whatever they normally did. They class opened their books, but then talked to whoever was close by.

Lily had read in the paper about Regulus and Sirius' father. Severus told her that Slughorn left with Regulus during the night. He didn't know when he'd be back. He laughed that there was a notice on their bulletin board that there would be more notices forthcoming.

By dinner, Slughorn had not returned, and Lily was angry. She tried to get Severus to say something, but he seemed not to care that Slughorn was gone.

Up at the Head Table, Minerva was back in her usual seat and volunteered to supervise detentions, rather than allow them to be canceled.

Albus sensed she had more on her mind so asked, "Is something wrong, Minerva?"

Her lips thinned for a moment before she replied, "I suppose I should give you the chance to explain yourself, if you are capable of sorting it without Horace to explain it to you."

"Sort what?"

"While you were at the Ministry last, were you told that Severus Snape's father was killed by Death Eaters?"

"Yes."

"What did you do?"

"Do? I was speaking to Barty about it. I had been to that pub, and I have to say I was sad to hear it."

Minerva repeated, "No, I meant exactly what I asked. What did you do? Did you try to contact Horace?"

"About what?"

"About anything, Albus. You are really ticking me off. I suppose before my disappointment overwhelms me, I should ask – did you find out as you were leaving the Ministry or sooner?"

"I'm not sure. It wasn't the day I left because that was when Bellatrix was in the paper. So many deaths in one family in such a short time ..."

"I don't give a shit about that."

"Minerva," Albus chided.

"I want to know if ..." Minerva looked away for a moment, then looked back, " … if your inaction caused someone's death."

"Who's?"

"Eileen Snape's."

"Severus' mother?"

"Yes, from what I understand, she was an invalid who did not leave the house."

"Why wasn't she at St. Mungo's?" Albus asked in confusion.

"How is her muggle husband going to visit her there?"

"Why would I be responsible, Minerva?"

"It wasn't until her obituary was in the paper that Severus went home. He would have been home prior to that to take care of her, if you could have been bothered to pass the message along."

"Take care of her? But he's in school, he couldn't take care of her."

"He's seventeen. That was his choice, not yours."

"I … I didn't take that choice away. I didn't know there was one."

"Did you even care there was one?"

"Of course I would care."

"It's too late for that now," she snapped.

"Why didn't anyone say anything?"

"Horace told Pomona she was being a Hufflepuff, and Hufflepuff sensibilities have no place with Slytherins. And you … you just stood there waiting for Horace to tell you what was important."

"No, I do care, Minerva."

"Why? Horace knows he squeaked under the wire with this one. He's seventeen and his parents are dead. No longer our problem outside of school, is he? Pomona knows that home did not get that way overnight. Years, probably his entire life."

"How would I know such things?"

"You don't even know if he's here or not for Christmas. There's been enough clues that another head of house may have seen it. St. Mungo's was on it fast enough."

"Earlier would have helped him more."

"Earlier? I was unaware St. Mungo's opening a complaint with the Ministry aided him at all."

"It helped the school. Poppy found that her records had been tampered with."

"I'm sure Severus was comforted by that. I think the person that benefited most was Argus."

Albus frowned. There was no need for Minerva to get sarcastic. This was very serious. How did the responsibility for Eileen Snape's death get laid at his feet, of all places? He had not even known she was dead.

*****************************************************

Lily worried him because she was agreeable to letting him sleep this weekend. She seemed to understand he needed to rest so hopefully would not poke at him every ten minutes.

Prof. McGonagall catching him on the floor, got Severus to thinking that Mr. Filch may know what connected these internal walls so he had spent some time getting a clean map together of his interior cold spots and was talking to the caretaker when Prof. Dumbledore came into his office.

With the crowd of filing cabinets, the boxes of paperwork to still be filed, the desk, Filch's chair, the three of them and two familiars, Severus suggested, "I could head back to where I was working last night, Mr. Filch."

"That'll be fine. What can I do for you, headmaster?"

"I was actually looking for Mr. Snape."

"Why? I've been here close to thirty minutes." Severus had not done anything today to cause anyone to look for him. A lot of activities were still attributed to him even without the Marauders pointing fingers. It was his word against the witness'.

"I wanted to check on how you were doing," Albus explained. Once he got some more facts sorted after dinner, he was not sure an apology would be well received.

Severus and Argus looked at each other. Severus shrugged and said, "Mr. Filch is fair. I have no complaints."

"Other whelps jealous? I hope Prof. McGonagall keeps the whole lot of them scrubbing mildew till their fingernails drop out." At first, Argus appreciated Snape's ability to work rather than destroy everything he laid a hand on. Normally, he would not care for all this book learning and some candy-sucking know-it-all saying there was a better way, but Snape started with what Argus told him to do rather than taking it upon himself to do something irresponsible like soaping a flight of stairs to claim it would aid in keeping shoes clean, therefore floors clean. Then once Snape publicly humiliated Peeves, Argus could only hope he was there for the encore. At last, something good that came out of a book! He also wasn't sure if Snape figured out if he was a squib. The boy was supposedly bright, but he never questioned why Argus never showed him any spells. He went and looked them up on his own.

"That's not exactly what I meant, but I am glad to here that the two of you are dealing well with the situation."

What situation was that? Severus wondered why Dumbledore even bothered talking to him. Moron was probably in here to sample any candy that Filch confiscated. Even though it was repetitious, Severus still wished Dumbledore would die choking on candy. Simple and ignoble.

Later, Severus pondered more important things. What did these papers of his father's mean? They were old, about military or government business, and meant nothing to him. The archaic language in the house paperwork was clearer to him. There was even a little map to show what little strip of land was their front garden, which Severus believed was the space directly in front of the door, and the plot of dirt in the back that they had fenced in.

The next piece of paper in the box was his mother's gobstone certificate so he put his father's stuff back on top. He was not ready for gobstones, or trying to figure out why his mother would save crap.

Severus lay down and studied his mother's wand and compared it to his own. He already knew they were both made of dark wood. Perhaps his was a little darker, but they could be the same and just had natural variation. His was less than an inch longer than hers. The only real difference was the handles. His circled in horizontal bands, hers was vertically lined in an octogonal, no nine-sided grip. Was that a nonagon? Nine sides or 1,260 degrees. Was there something special about that? He was born on the ninth. And Severus was a _non_entity.

*****************************************************

For the rest of the week, the students grumbled about the unrelenting cold for their Hogsmeade weekend, and were delighted Prof. Slughorn did not return. Well, the Ravenclaws weren't happy, but they're Ravenclaws. The Slytherins actually got Prof. Upsilon to fill in as their head of house. He broke into poor English for the first and second years, but everyone else either had to speak ancient Greek or to hell with them. He was strange. He also visited their common room in the evening, but not in his pajamas. He told a story every night too.

Without Slughorn around, Severus felt that Dumbledore must be bloody bored because he kept wandering around the castle. To provide more choking hazards, Severus imitated Wilkes and transfigured lots of sherbet lemons. Dumbledore struck him as the sort that would eat candy off the floor, if he thought no one was watching.

Lily was nervous about Saturday. Sev said they'd shag before he took a nap, but in a way, it sounded like he was using it to bargain for time to sleep. She also had been spending some time away from Severus looking around the library at those new helpful books, other than pleasing her hard-working wizard by cooking, cleaning and popping out little wizard juniors.

All her thoughts of Severus not wanting to shag her left as soon as they were alone after breakfast Saturday. Lily stripped hers and his clothes off, and threw herself on him hardly before he was finished casting spells to make them comfortable, secure and quiet. Over an hour later, Lily was sweaty, very satisfied and … tired. That was new.

"Don't get dressed, Sev. I want to give you a massage."

"I don't think massaging it is going to help for a bit, Lily."

"Not there. I meant your shoulders and back."

"I have a potion to help me fall asleep."

"How about you take half of it so you don't miss lunch." Lily ran her hand along his side. Was he thinner?

"Alright," he agreed. If he slept all day, Lily would be bored.

"Get comfy, and lay on your stomach."

"Can't I put on some clothes?"

"I have a blanket for us, Sev, and besides, I've seen it all," she said widening her eyes and raising her eyebrows.

Severus thought Lily was mad. Now his whole body. Being fascinated by his cock was certifiable enough. She also said Spinner's End was brilliant. He'd like to see her say that if he sent her outside to take a piss in this weather.

He cleaned up where they had been shagging and lay down with a transfigured pillow and the blanket Lily offered him. Severus drank half the potion, Lily took the remainder and put it aside. She then straddled him from behind and pushed his hair out of the way to start on his neck.

Lily's fingers kneading the back of his neck felt odd. Perhaps it was what she was doing. His flesh did not have any give so there was nothing for her to move or prod. The potion was relaxing him, but then he felt his bum getting slimy from Lily. Why did she leak like that? When the guys were talking about what they did not like about girls physically, they never mentioned gallons of goo leaking out of them afterwards. Severus knew some of it was from him, but he had seen Lily coax it out of him enough times now to know he did not produce bucketfuls. He hoped she cleaned it up.

Severus was still twitchy as Lily spread her hands to move from his neck to his shoulders. This was supposed to help him relax. If he trusted her enough to touch his thing and be completely undressed, why was there a problem with this? She moved her hands down to his waist and pushed up his back on each side of his sharply defined spine.

Sighing as his shoulder jerked as she stopped to trace a shallow line, she leaned down and kissed a patch of heavy pockmarks, before stretching out on top of Severus.

Severus' body was not comfortable. Rather than making it obvious that she was uneasy, Lily said, "Budge Sev, or you'll end up crushed beneath me."

"Mmm," was all he replied as he rolled onto his side. Lily let herself get rolled with him, and ended up with her face tucked close to the back of his neck. She pushed his hair aside so her mouth was against his skin. Her head was resting on the pillow so she should remain comfortable like this for a while. Lily let her upper hand drift in front of him, but put it on his chest to hug him, rather than going lower.

Severus was snoring within minutes. Lily let herself doze off, listening to him.

She woke, but did not feel like moving at first. Sev was still snoring, and she matched his rhythm, breathing through her nose on his neck. Lily could enjoy this all the time. She wriggled her body against his back, and kissed his neck then moved her mouth along his shoulder. Lifting herself up on her elbow, she moved to the outside of his shoulder and went further along his arm, while looking over him.

Sev's mouth was open, and he was drooling. Did he do that all the time when he slept? Snores and drools, what a catch.

Lily took this chance to slowly lower the blanket off his back and look at it carefully. His bottom was horrible. It did not feel lumpy, but the skin was terribly uneven under her fingertips. His snoring hesitated a couple times while she explored. He did not make any other noise, so Lily could not determine if he was in pain or discomfited by her touch. She leaned down and kissed the base of his spine before sliding out from behind him, and covering Severus back up.

Now that she was the only one awake, Lily was self-conscious of being nude? She got around to the other side of Severus, sat down and cast a warming charm on herself. It would not be fair to clothe herself after she told Sev that he could not dress.

Looking at his face, Lily noticed that Severus had mostly closed his mouth so drool was no longer leaking out. Not that she did not like Sev drooling. That was cute. Now, his face was loose. Not concentrating on anything, and without thoughts disturbing him.

Severus was confusing. So many things he would shrug off and within days claim it was old, or in the past. Lily got angrier than Sev over some of them, but it was completely understandable that an injury to his mother was unforgivable. Lily did not hold her in high regard, but to suffer for days, or maybe longer in her mind, since she was not sure of Mrs. Snape's sanity, and die without given a chance to see her husband or son one last time? Lily was sure she recognized both of them at least, even if Sev had to snap his fingers in front of her face to get her attention.

Nothing could be done about Sev's mum now. And Dumbledore? It wasn't a crime to not pass along information. Lily and Severus could have a personal vendetta against him, but what good what that do? Would the Marauder-loving protector of bad boys who attacked the female students care that someone's mum was dead because of him? Sev's mum did nothing for him. If she was still alive, Severus would probably be with her now, and not at school. Lily did not know what could be done for Sev's mum. Would they have been able to hire someone to take care of her while Severus finished school? Sev had no money.

Lily did not want Severus to suffer so much. She did not want him to forget either. What was she supposed to do?

****************************************************

Being a Black, Regulus was used to kiss-ups to himself, his parents, and uncle Cygnus' family. Horace Slughorn took the cake however, both figuratively and literally. The man had made himself a guest at Number Twelve Grimmauld Place for days.

The house was full with guests. Regulus had seen Slughorn in his silk pajamas many times at school, but when he came to the breakfast table in them in front of his mother, it was indecent. And the way he was so charming, comforting and simply enough to make Regulus noisily expel everything from his stomach. He was doing this on purpose, but why? Slughorn would disappear for a day or so with other students when a family member died, and was an avid funeral attendant. He had lots of reasons to be anywhere but Hogwarts, but even an idiot like Dumbledore would realize he took off for days.

He could think that Slughorn took a real interest in his students, but the man didn't even bother taking Snape home. He let Sprout do it, and no one in Slytherin thought she did a very good job because the two of them were back for lunch. It wasn't that Snape was liked, but the school's rhetoric about how every student was welcome, even muggleborns, was continually exposed to be a sham by the knutless half-blood. There was nothing fair about his treatment. Two parents died so he was excused from two classes, one each, and still had detention every night for no reason. Although Reg saw Snape daily, the only crack in his facade was he was looking ill, or more so than usual.

Dumbledore, Slughorn, and all the rest of them were such hypocrites. Like this Dark Lord, father was a muggle and mother a squib. Hypocrisy was everywhere … Merlin's balls, was Slughorn going back to the funeral buffet for more food? Maybe he should remove the selection of bottles from the mixed drink cart, and use that to get his overloaded plate back across the room. Now that the funeral was over, he better get out of their house and waddle his bloody self to the next free meal.

Drowning his sorrow in food showed that Horace was a man of deep feelings, he shared with Walburga. Much like herself. Poor woman, who's fine figure was hidden beneath her unhappiness. Eldest son was a monumental disappointment, and now the untimely loss of her physically fit husband leaving her with a young boy to still raise. All on her own, and with so many potential enemies out there. There was no real clues to Orion's death. The meat cleavers that would appear in their house and sunk into the front door of number twelve could have been left by any of them, not just the Parkin family. That was a pity too. This was an excellent home. Some of the wealthiest wizards preferred some remote estate, but it was a sign of true sophistication when one lived in the heart of London, like Walburga. And the food … well, Horace simply could not get enough of this fine cuisine. Obviously the Black family, especially Walburga and poor, little Regulus, needed his assistance for the time being.

****************************************************

Albus had headed to Hogsmeade in the wake of the students with some vague ideas. Asking Severus how he was, was not resulting in any honest answers. His mind was also closed, but his dark glares spoke volumes.

He joined the students at Honeyduke's and while idly making his selections and requesting samples, spent close to two hours waiting for some sign of the bereaved Slytherin. At last, he considered that Severus had probably gone to the candy store first thing. Albus would have, if he were in his shoes.

He went over to the Three Broomsticks, ordered a little pick-me-up refreshment and asked Rosmerta if she had seen Severus yet. Even after Albus tried to describe him at length, Rosmerta had no idea who he meant.

Although Severus did not strike Albus as the typical Zonko's customer, he went there also, but still did not find him.

Thinking hard while walking down the street, and trying to visualize where he would go when he was depressed and miserable, Albus caught sight of the Hog's Head, down the side street. It would not be where he'd go, but the Hog's Head was depressed and miserable. Perhaps it attracted unhappy patrons, in addition to its normal group of those seeking cheap drinks without anything extra, like ambiance, lights, clean glasses, unsticky floors and friendly smiles.

His eyesight was still adjusting to the dark interior with its eye-watering miasma of smoke and goat stink, when a familiar voice sneered, "Lost?"

Albus turned to look at his brother who was pretending to wipe a drinking glass clean. Since he was not addressed by name, Albus decided to return the favor. "No, I was looking for a particular student."

With an obvious look around the room to indicate there were currently no Hogwarts students at the tables, the glass wiper replied, "Oh."

"Perhaps you could tell me if he was here already today?"

"You have no business prying into who my patrons are. The students are welcome here, and I am law-abiding."

Getting annoyed, Albus replied, "It's not like that. I know he's of age."

"Than what do you care?"

"Stop being ..."

A twinkle lit in Aberforth's eyes, as he crowed, "You did something. I know that guilty look. Who's life did you ruin this time?"

"I didn't come in here to pick a fight with you."

"Nose still smart from last time?"

Albus rolled his eyes, and quietly said, "Just tell me, has Severus Snape been in here?"

"Aren't you a bit late on that one?"

"What?"

"It wasn't today. Months ago. Knowing you, you probably saw three little innocent girls getting lured here by drooling and panting boys. I saw three lusting Gryffindor girls dragging three boys upstairs."

"What?"

"Don't go fogging you spectacles over Gryffindors touching Slytherins, you self-righteous prick. They knew what they were about … wait, did you have something to do with that werewolf?"

"The Ministry investigated that."

"Fat load of good they did. The beast got locked up, but the filth that thinks it's funny to play with werewolves bought his way to freedom. My pub's still open that time of night so my goats are out back. My girls could have been eaten up, like it did to your students."

Albus was not here to inquire about goats. "Was he in here today or not?"

"Nah. If any berk brought his girl in here for a Valentine's Day date, she'd bang his head 'gainst the table till the white meat showed."

"Date?"

"You're around them so much you get blind to that sort of thing? You recognize it by one boy holding one girl's hand. Always seen in Hogsmeade immediately following Valentine's Day. Huge weekend for Honeydukes and the Three Broomsticks. Also Zonkos for the lads that did not find a girl wanting to hold their sticky fingers."

Albus gave that some thought. Severus date? His parents recently died so … he tried to remember. When Albus' father died, he remembered the letter. His emotions were distant. He had not seen him in a long time, and being in Azkaban was sort of like being dead already. His mother's death was entirely different. He canceled his plans with Doge, and headed home immediately. Dating was not ... no, he was home only a short while before he met Gellert. They did not date, but they talked and shared ideas and that was so much better than Albus' trips to Hogsmeade as a young teen with the fellows and later some girls. There may have been a hand held here and there, but there was none of this 'knowing what they were about'. Definitely not. There was candy, a butterbeer, and the walk to and from the school. In fact, Albus would have been frightened if some girl tried to drag him upstairs.

"Oh, that's right, your heart's a shriveled little lump of ice."

"I didn't come in here for insults."

"That's the only thing I'd serve you for free."

*****************************************************

Severus eventually woke with Lily stroking her fingers over his face. They began kissing, holding each other, moving their bodies in ways that felt wonderfully natural, and then made love slowly, except for when Lily needed to be Lily.

Hoping that once for him was enough this time, Severus suggested, "You mentioned lunch earlier?"

"We missed it in the Great Hall. Kitchen?"

"Alright. What did you want to do after that?"

"Don't you need more sleep?"

"I feel better. Resting with you works wonders, Lily."

"You can work wonders too, Sev," Lily answered, while stretching her arms overhead while she continued sitting on his lap. When Severus did not take her blatant hint, she leaned forward to put her breast to his mouth.

It was at least another hour before they were dressed.

*****************************************************

Albus realized he shouldn't have let Aberforth's comments get to him. He was also humbled when he realized he wasted time in Hogsmeade. Mr. Filch's list reported that Severus had not left the castle. Braving the cold for candy, butterbeer and hand holding was all wrong for someone like Severus. Normally, he was practical. Right now, maybe not. However, Severus did frequent the kitchens so Albus headed that way to see if the elves had seen him today.

Miss Evans passed him and barely returned his greeting. He stopped and turned. She had been carrying a picnic basket. Not unusual in late spring, but in freezing temperatures? Casting a strong disillusionment charm to render himself invisible, Albus followed. Perhaps now he'd find out what he could do to repair the damage he had done.

*****************************************************

The news caught up with Sirius in Casablanca. Apolline wanted to see big animals, other than Sirius, so they were arranging a tour of the Dark Continent, including safaris and Victoria Falls. They were only beginning, and planned to end up in Egypt in about a month or two. There was no hurry.

The first thing Sirius thought was 'So the old man is dead? Good.' A slow grin spread on his face as he nodded in satisfaction. He didn't have to do anything since he wasn't allowed in England. Too bad, so sad.

The old bastard deserved it for kicking him out of the house and disowning him, instead of making the effort to clear his name. The allowance he and Apolline had to eek out a living on was a pittance compared to what was in the Black vault.

Besides, Apolline wouldn't like him taking a leak on his father's coffin anyway. She was a stickler for manners around company.

*****************************************************

Lily returned to their furnished lair. Severus opened his eyes when she entered. He had already set out a chess board with his mother's set on the table in front of the monstrous divan that dominated this room.

"If you are still tired, you can go back to sleep after we eat."

He shrugged, "I'm fine. Besides wouldn't you want me slightly tired to beat me?"

"I'm beating you whether you're awake or in a coma, Sev."

Phi stirred from her nice perch that recently had its water bowl freshened by Severus, and dove past Lily at something.

"Dropping bacon behind you?" Severus asked.

"No," replied Lily. "Maybe your bird wants to go out?"

"She'd tell me," Severus replied. He had taken her out a short time ago when Lily was on her errands.

Lily laughed. She had seen Phi's potty dance.

Albus gave a brief sigh of relief. The bird sensed him. Hopefully, he confused it enough for it to ignore him, but not to the extent that they considered it ill.

This room was cozy. All it needed was a fireplace. Albus remembered an older relative having a sofa such as that. It was very uncomfortable, and so deep that it swallowed him up as a child. Severus was sitting on it lengthwise, his legs stretched out across the seat, with some new bed pillows propped against the thinly upholstered massive wooden arm to make it more comfortable for his back. They had a folded blanket draped over the back.

"I got pease pudding for you," Lily announced as she started unloading her transfigured basket. "Can I move the chess set for now?"

"Sure."

Lily laid out all her food. Besides pease pudding, there was also a nice sized ham joint to go with it, along with some vegetables and fruit. Looking at it away from the kitchen, perhaps it was too big for Lily to eat alone. Luckily Phi was like a rubbish disposal.

She got together a boring plate for Sev with a potato and some plainly prepared vegetables, and handed it over to him, before getting a lovely plate together for herself. "Did you want all these cherries?" Lily asked, "Or can I put some on the side for Phi?"

"Could you please pass them over to me, Lily?"

Lily looked at them. They looked alright to her. She gave them to Severus. He didn't study them, but offered one to Phi almost immediately. The bird was acting odd, or was it a new trick? Rather than flying, she walked across the floor and pulled herself up the divan arm until Sev reached down to give her a boost up.

She frowned in silence. Phi should not be that close to him while he was eating. It was a bad habit. As she took a seat on the opposite side, Severus asked, "Could you please sit next to me, Lily?"

"I have a plate full of ham, Sev," Lily pointed out. It had a distinctive smell that he may not care for.

She saw his eyes shift from side to side as he replied, "Mmmm."

He cast a couple spells nonverabally then _muffilato_. "Phi thinks something followed you in. Maybe Peeves? But I don't find any ectoplasmic substances still here."

Lily shrugged in response, and replied, "Maybe he'll compose a chess song. There's already a rhyme for pease pudding."

"There is?" he asked, lifting the _muffilato_.

"Yeah, you know pease porridge hot?"

"Oh, I thought that was about porridge."

"Maybe it's both in the same pot."

"I'm salivating at the thought."

"I doubt it, Sev," Lily replied, attacking her ham to slice it into bite-sized pieces. Phi communicating with Severus was unreliable. It could have been something small or shiny that got her attention, or Lily carrying food.

Severus ate and gave some items to Phi, while straining his ears to hear anything unusual. The feeling of being watched could be in his own mind, rather than something in here. Perhaps he was nervous because Lily devoured all that ham, except for the bone in the center, and was filling her plate with other items now. Rather than pease porridge, Jack Sprat and his wife would be more appropriate. Besides the curse from the werewolf wounds, could shagging have something to do with her large appetite?

Once he was done, Severus climbed over the back of the divan, rather than disturb Lily while she was gorging herself, and took Phi's food bowl and filled it for her with different foods. He was going to have to write to that store in Diagon Alley about healthy raven food, but he had little money left to buy anything for her. Bowls and things for her comfort could be transfigured. The house elves felt food made with suet, of all things, was good for her in the winter to keep her energy high. Books and Phi agreed, and it wasn't just a glob of fat, but it was packed with seeds, nuts and fruit.

He sorted out what was left to neaten the table, and put together some fruit for him to snack on while they played chess. With this uneasy feeling that they weren't alone, Severus did not want to expose him or Lily to a possible voyeur, even if it wasn't something as immature as Peeves. He felt when Lily and him decided to play chess earlier that it was unlikely they'd actually play. Lily probably had at least a dozen sexual positions still in mind for this afternoon, now that she was rested and fed.

Mr. Snape and Miss Evans were rather … domestic. Even if Aberforth was right that Albus did not understand what happened on a date between a boy and a girl, chess for Valentine's Day? Minerva was rather challenging, and she and Albus may eat while playing, but they were definitely not on a date when they played each other. Perhaps this removal from the rest of Hogwarts was helpful to Mr. Snape? Severus had nowhere to go, other than the empty home of his parents, hence the reason for his quick return to the school. He did not seem to be in any distress right now.

Lily frowned at the board. What was she doing wrong? She did alright against Mary or Helen. Severus was pretending he wasn't concentrating by playing with his plate of berries and apple slices.

He thought he heard something in the corner, and was trying to watch it out of the corner of his eye when he noticed Lily palm one of his knights off the board.

"If you want to put some of your pieces back into play, go ahead, Lily."

"Really?"

"It doesn't matter. It's a game."

Lily was already rousing her pieces to replace them on the board. "How about if we upped the stakes, Sev?"

"Stakes?"

"Strip chess."

"Don't be silly."

"Huh?"

"There's a certain sanctity regarding a game of chess," Severus replied, but Lily noticed his eyes were looking around the room, rather than at her or the game.

She sighed. Sev really thought there was something watching them? He was so paranoid, and he hardly understood anything Phi said, if she was saying anything. Mary messed him up more with that bird than … Mary. Could it be Mary? What would she do? What could she do? Lily knew Gryffindors, other than herself, could do some pretty stupid and destructive things. Mary wanted Severus, but he would be too smart for her? Or was Severus' distrust of everyone rubbing off on Lily? Lily couldn't expect him to suddenly see there was not someone waiting to hurt him everywhere he went. This current fear of his might be leftover from being undressed so long earlier today for her. Severus was a bit crazy.

*****************************************************

Not quite doubting Sev's sanity, Lily asked Mary later, "Were you watching us earlier today?"

"Why would I watch you?"

"Never mind."

"Guilt catching up to you?"

"No."

"And what did you tell Severus about me?" Mary demanded. "He won't even look at me."

Having to live with Mary, Lily told the hugest lie ever. "Uh, Severus didn't say it as such, but you sort of remind him of his mum."

"I do?"

"He's pretty upset over her."

"But they say a man wants a wife that reminds him of his mother. She was pureblood, right?"

A wife like their mother? Lily was nothing like Mrs. Snape. Mary was madder than Severus. Not sure whether Sev's mother was or not, Lily simply agreed, "I believe so."

Mary was heartened. What was a pity shag after his parents died? Plenty of people's first was nothing memorable. It was who ended up with the ring on her finger. Mrs. Mary Snape.

*****************************************************

Severus was in bed looking at paperwork again. This time he dug into his mother's. He sighed because his mother did not do well on her OWLs. Not well at all, but she had all his NEWT level texts? Did she lie to her parents and they bought her all the books? He dug down and found her NEWT grades. She took tests in all the subjects he had books for, but still scored many A's. Were standards crappier in the 1940s than they were in the 1970s? Or did 'A' used to stand for Awesome?

She had pages full of pedigree. Why bother? When did any of these families do anything for her? Her parents only had her. There were no aunts, uncles or cousins for him to have some tearful reunion with. Years were listed as his grandparents' deaths. Eileen's father in 1949, and her mother in 1951. Severus' parents married in 1953, and he was born in 1960.

He did not know much about other families and how they decided how many children to have. Most families had more children. Was seven years the right amount of time to wait to have a first child? He had heard from other Slytherins about fertility. Something about pureblood women were not animals so were only expected to have one or two children during their lifetime, but some of them never had children at all, even with potions and charms. Was that why his parents only had him, or was he such a disappointment, they decided not to waste any time or resources having a second one?

More papers with names and dates with the Gringotts logo. What was this crap, and why would goblins care what wizards were related to who? His mother was the daughter of either her mother or father, then that grandparent was related to someone and so on. Some of these went back to people that were alive in the 1600s. What a fucking waste of parchment and whoever wrote this shit up. No wonder why everyone around here was obsessed with who their parents were.

Severus sorted her parchments into neat piles. She had them stacked in no particular order. Lists of family crap could go on the bottom, or just above the Gobstones parchment and her official grades. He doubted his mother's lackluster grades were what motivated Slughorn to condemn Severus as equally dull. Plenty of Slytherins were not on track to obtain decent NEWTs because they did so poorly on their OWLs, or simply did not feel like burdening themselves with more than the minimum number of classes.

Even though he was putting up a brave front for Lily, and anyone who asked, Slughorn spending days at the Blacks was hurtful. Severus would not have suitable accommodations for a house guest. Regulus was not a penniless orphan that needed assistance. He had loads of family with wealth and influence. It was simply everyone thought Sirius bloody Black's father was more important than both his parents put together. The blighter was killed in Knockturn Alley, and no one thought he made a wrong turn and ended up in the bad part of town.

Sometimes Severus was such a dunderhead. Laying on his back crying and then tears ran down into his ears. Wasn't drowning as his own mucus leaked down the back of his throat moronic enough?

*****************************************************

Atlas received a package from Joe Rue. An article for The Practical Potioneer? One of Severus' substitutions worked. Eyeballs? Ugh. That's why Atlas did not like Potions.

Rue wanted them to review his draft. Mighty fair of him. Atlas would get together with Severus after breakfast.

At the Slytherin table, Severus had received mail of his own. He was looking at it and wondering if it was a joke. A form from Gringotts and a key, along with an accounting of who he was related to from the early 1800s. He was asked to sign it and return it with their owl to accept a vault. Was there some penalty for signing it? Why would his mother keep these, instead of signing them? The goblins' owl was impatient and marching in a circle on the table, annoying him, Phi and anyone eating in the vicinity. Wring its neck … he think that was more Phi than him. He looked at it and thought Chicken. Severus dismissed the owl, rather than giving it the usual Snape treatment of throwing it into a pot of boiling water. Would his mother rather cook the owl in front of her, rather than accept the contents of a vault? There was nothing on here saying what was in it. Coins, books, art, gobstones? If anyone figured out they'd be leaving something to Eileen or Severus Snape, they would have emptied it first. Perhaps he could take all these forms to Gringotts over Easter break and have it explained to him. It was rather hard to believe that his mother did not sign them just because she felt like eating the Gringotts' owls.

*****************************************************

AN: Orion forgot his records remove any wizard or witch who marries a muggle. The Crabbes are smarter than that?

AN: What triggered my odd relationship with Madam Pomfrey? If a three-headed dog bit Snape, why did he go to Filch to bandage him? If Hagrid and Filch knew he was one of the staff guarding the stone, it's doubtful Pomfrey did not. She also sorted Ron's 'dog bite' from Norbert without asking questions.

AN: I confess I have a relative that boils ham. That's not all, it's boils for so long before it's served, that it no longer tastes like ham.


	38. Chapter 38 Something to Cry About

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 38 Something to Cry About

Severus was not as excited as Prof. Abstractus was regarding a substitute for hardly used eyeballs. If Severus was feeling better, he might be tempted to find more uses for this compound. The augurey was quite magical, but their repellent feathers discouraged many from looking further, except for the genius that found that eyeballs plucked out of the head of a live bird were efficient for weather and mood-altering use.

The draft of the article was correct from his point of view. Severus did none of the hands-on brewing. Prof. Abstractus attempted to get him hopeful that this would allow him access to some of the school's potions equipment and inexpensive ingredients from the student stores. Severus sighed in response, the man may be at the school, but he had no clue what went on around here. There were three problems with this idea – Slughorn, Dumbledore and free time.

At the very least, he would not have to worry about his Arithmancy grade for a while. The lack of Latin sounds in Joe Rue's name did not give Severus hope that this would lead to a potion apprenticeship in Great Britain. For all her talk of adventure, Lily was not amenable whenever he mentioned finding better opportunities elsewhere. He'd have to wait till for the outcome of her Healer apprenticeship before he broached it again. She interpreted his mad suggestion about Australia as an attempt to get her away from her family, rather than heading to a country settled by criminals who might more lenient about ancestors.

Regulus returned to Hogwarts in a foul mood and let all of Slytherin know it. From the way he was spitting mad, it was not about his father dying. Everything would carry on with the Black family since his father's father, Arcturus, was still alive, in charge of his mental faculties and knew his mother could take care of things in his immediate household. Slughorn had burrowed deeply under his skin during the days they were absent from school. More than his parasitic nature, Regulus suspected the old duffer fancied his house, food and his mother, in that order. And then, if that was not enough, the other parasite reared his ugly head. Sirius had written his mother demanding money as his due from his father dying. Stupid berk did not realize when he was disowned by his father that meant he received nothing upon his father's death.

Although Severus would normally be happy to hear of Sirius Black being thwarted, especially when he was being especially dimwitted, there was further discussion and he found out that Sirius received a generous monthly allowance from the Blacks still. A month? Severus could live on an amount like that for years, or purchase someplace to live or set up his own potions laboratory. Every month, Sirius Black got a huge number of galleons because he was Sirius Black.

Severus was baffled by the other Slytherins. Not that they were talking in front of him like he wasn't there, but what they were talking about. Like Black, they had no intention of supporting their wives and families, other than collecting a monthly stipend from their inexhaustible family vault, with larger withdrawals to cover bigger expenses. That seemed to be Black's problem. He was not getting larger amounts upon request. The more Sirius Black's finances and holdings were discussed, the sicker Severus felt. He received a generous monetary dowry and a large townhouse in Paris from his wife's French family, along with a small estate in southern France for getting away. The two of them had been seen all over Europe for months now as they continued on their extended honeymoon. The absolute inconceivability of someone being exiled from his own country for killing another and spending his supposed punishment in one long, carefree party was intrinsically Sirius Black. It left Severus feeling gutted.

After things seemed like they were getting back on track for Lily with Severus with Valentine's Day week, he no longer liked their room with the huge divan that had plenty of room for shagging, and was comfortable enough to snuggle and nap on after Sev cast a cushioning charm on it. He was leery of their other private hideaways too. Casting minutes of spells before he'd give in to Lily. He would no longer completely undress either. He tried to tell her that something happened to Phi to disorient her that day, but since it had not happened once since then, Lily did not what the big deal was. Severus was letting his imagined fears interfere with his life, and hers.

***************************************

Someone must have complained loud and long, or had a connection at the Ministry because a whole bunch of students were taking their apparition test prior to Easter. Lily had made a face when she saw the list. January birthdays together. Just terrific. What if Severus asked her to marry him again? He may have reached a point where Lily's hesitation could make him do something desperate, or even harm himself. She didn't want his current difficulties to color her decision either.

Lily felt that Severus was becoming worse rather than better. Weeks had passed, and he still would not get completely undressed for her, besides wanting the lighting very dim. He was twitchier than ever and had crossed the border into nervous, anxious and jumpy. His delusion that something could be watching them at any time within the castle was driving Lily mad. She realized it was his lack of sleep, but he was uninterested in catching up on the weekends with Lily watching over him due to his mysterious voyeur, and would not take any potions that would 'endanger' him in Slytherin.

He still fell asleep with Lily. It was inevitable whenever he lay down quietly, and Lily did nothing to distract him. Although rubbing his shoulders did nothing, she figured out that Severus relaxed when he was looking at her. Lily had known that from the time he dozed off after their first kiss, but she was always interested in doing something new with Sev.

Severus was getting all his schoolwork done and whatever he got up to for Mr. Filch. However, Lily found him less excitable, if that was a way to put it. Severus had no enthusiasm for activities without Lily. Even when one of his crazy arithmancy things got published in The Practical Potioneer. The hissing and catcalls that came from Gryffindor table when the headmaster made an announcement regarding it were humiliating to Lily. She and Mary were the only two clapping at their table. The Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs were politely encouraging, though Lily did notice Dirk Cresswell looked rather sour, and the Slytherin table was mixed. Even so, they were mature enough not to act like the toerags on the her side of the Hall.

Why the hell was Slughorn putting his hands in the air and nodding his head? If Severus did not know better, it would almost look like the son of a bitch was trying to take credit for his equation and solution. He sighed. If Prof. Abstractus had not found such a remote potions brewer, it actually might have had Slughorn's name included, instead of Joe Rue, Atlas Abstractus and Severus Snape. Or even better, just Horace Slughorn alone. He did not need them to publish in that journal. Only one of the authors needed to belong to the Most Extraordinary Society of Potioneers. Slughorn was one, and this Joe Rue fellow was another, who was very far away and did not know that Slughorn claimed to know everyone. Rue's photo was even included. Seemed it was a standard practice to include the Potioneer's picture and vita with the article. Severus had looked at it. Rue was better looking than him. His nose was average looking, but his face looked disproportionately wide, and his eyes were small and set a bit too close together. He was young and groomed his beard, rather than the British style of simply letting it grow and not trimming it at all till it became a tripping hazard.

After dinner, Lily was on his case. "You could have been a little more gracious, Sev. You know how most Gryffindors are. Loud, obnoxious and don't care about schoolwork."

He glanced at her and decided not to reply to add 'self-centered' and 'uncaring' to her list of fine Gryffindor traits. Why couldn't Lily have been sorted into Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff? If she was in Ravenclaw, he might be able to understand why she downplayed his feelings. Perhaps it was because she knew he had no one else now. Severus had to pay attention to her and try to please Lily, or else she'd get angry, stop talking to him, and spend her time with her other friends. Even though he had tampered with Lily's enjoyment of other men, she could still shag them and go on to marry one of them.

"Well?" she asked.

"Huh?"

"I said, you should take more pride in your accomplishments. A serious contribution to potions."

"It's not that big a deal, Lily. It's not as if I found an alternate to one of the big ones, like a substitute for phoenix tears."

"You did not need to sit there with a sneer on your face."

With a growl of exasperation, Severus informed her, "I was not sneering. I was having difficulty breathing because the air in the Great Hall became so thick with envy."

Lily rolled her eyes at Severus. Then she asked him about his homework to plan out how they'd best utilize their time in the library.

***************************************

All of the sixth year students born in January and February passed their apparition test. There were a couple near misses, but it got sorted on the second or third try.

Although Lily passed on the her first attempt, and so did Severus, she was disappointed that Severus had not reminded her how close they were to the paperwork to file for a different license. Not that Lily was about to answer 'yes', but she would like to be asked. Had Severus changed his mind? He would have said something if he did, or would he? If Lily never said she would marry him, he may not feel obligated to say he reconsidered. Lily reached her conclusion that if Severus had changed his mind, it was definitely due to his own current problems, rather than something she did.

As Prof. McGonagall was having them line up to go back to the floos, who should come strutting through the double doors, but James Potter?

Lily hoped those two people following in his wake were his parents because the toerag was heading right for Severus and her. The rest of the students were not happy to see him, but were relieved Potter had not shown up in time to stop them from testing.

James knew as soon as he saw beautifully normal-colored skinned Evans when he came in the doors that today was going to bring big changes. Great changes. "It's my birthday today, Evans. How about a kiss?"

"Never! Get away from me."

Severus was prepared to separate Potter's lips from his face and plant them up Potter's own arsehole, if he got within five feet of Lily.

"Mr. Potter," Prof. McGonagall remanded, with the last 'r' rolling as her temper flared and heightened her brogue. "You are to leave my students in peace."

"Ah, come on, Professor," James replied with a lopsided grin. "Hey Evans, you got some time off soon. Why don't you come with me..."

"Get away from me, and don't come near my house either. It's your birthday and now you are legally responsible for your own actions, even if you still are an immature toerag."

James laughed it off, "That's a good one, Evans. If you don't have time now, I'll write ..." His demeanor suddenly changed. Snape was standing behind Evans and had his slimy hand on her waist.

Guessing at what distracted Potter, since their eyes had locked, Severus smirked, as only he could smirk, now that his father was dead. Probably due to Potter somehow. He did not feel like smiling, however nothing got Potter to draw his wand faster. Would he fall for it in front of all these witnesses, including Ministry employees, Prof. McGonagall and his own parents with Magical Law Enforcement just a shout away? YES.

Drawing his wand, James declared, "Get your greasy ..." His father had grabbed his wand, and James was embarrassed to get into a tug of war with him in front of Evans. "Let go. Can't you see?"

"Let go, James."

"Jamie, stop it!" shouted his mother. What was wrong with him? A girl from school says she doesn't want to kiss him, and he turned into an animal. Drawing his wand in front of these people in the Ministry. She never would have believed it if she hadn't seen it for herself. She so wanted to believe that her Jamie did not jinx all those young ladies, and now he was fighting with his father, rather than coming to his senses.

"_Expelliarmus_." Minerva McGonagall was not going to stand for Potter having the balls to attack Miss Evans right in front of her. She advised, "You two should face facts. Keep that wand away from him. You son is an uncaring bully, and he'll end up in Azkaban or worse at this rate."

"What?" yelled James. Why was McGonagall trying to make him look like the bad guy? "It's Snape. Didn't you see what he did?"

"Mr. Snape was standing in line, where I told him to stand. You may not have to take instruction from me any longer, Potter, but I insist you do not attack others as you encounter them on the street or in the Ministry itself."

Mrs. Potter was looking at the students present. There was only one male Slytherin. Why did James obsess over that one? He was ugly, his hair was too long and mostly covering his face, but not enough see that he had horrible pockmarks, and he had terrible posture. He was right next to the girl that James had been bothering. If this Snape had done something to her Jamie, she would have seen it.

James couldn't believe it. His wand kept away from him, and his father saying he couldn't take his apparition test today. He was seventeen, damn it. It was his right to be tested, no matter what his parents said, but these Ministry parchment pushers would not test him when he demanded it. And then, the students from Hogwarts, even Evans too, were laughing at him, and returning to Hogwarts with his name on their snickering lips.

They would not be laughing when he was a famous quidditch player. He needed an apparition license to get to practices. James did not know where yet, but he'd need it. He was still deciding which team's robes looked best on him. He was leaning towards the Falmouth Falcons, but thought the Prides' robes were striking.

***************************************

Severus did not know what the added excitement was regarding the upcoming Easter break. Lily was doing a great deal of talking about what they could do. He did not know why because with Petunia's wedding in less than two months, Lily should be considering her family needed her for things, other than this gown fitting for maids of honor, whatever those were. He did not understand what Lily was talking about, other than she was one of them. She also felt pink was the wrong color to go with her hair, and Petunia chose it on purpose. Severus considered Petunia capable of many underhanded things, but choosing colors for her own wedding to make her sister looked 'washed out' in the photographs?

Prof. McGonagall was also pestering him. He had thought she was asking more questions because Slughorn was away frequently. Upsilon had not been a Hogwarts' student, so his management method of Slytherins with the evening morality tales from different cultures, might get the deputy Headmistress concerned. Unfortunately, she asked about Severus, rather than Slughorn, so there was little opportunity for him to voice his reasons to sack Slughorn such as not teaching, not doing his head of house duties, and kept claiming he was helping a student, while Regulus Black was at Hogwarts, not home.

He did not bother answering Dumbledore's questions. In a castle as immense as Hogwarts, his candy-clicking mouth could be far away from Severus. Just as it had been for years, and Severus wished it would return to that. It would be best for both of them if they treated each other like strangers, rather than this 'my boy' shit. Severus was not Dumbledore's boy or man or whatever. Never. He wished Dumbledore died alone, choking on a clicking hard candy, and hoped it lodged in his throat to create some very painful choking as no one lifted a finger to help while the old self-centered liar kept holding onto hope that someone could come through the door any second and save him. If he could make a grotesque face while he choked, that would be better to leave an unsightly body. Perhaps soil himself too, at the end.

Severus had his own ideas as to what he'd do. He had never celebrated Easter so there was no call on his time to do whatever Lily was talking about with rabbits, eggs and baskets. Other than that, he would be available for Lily. He could look through the things still in Spinner's End more closely and box up the books. If he could manage it, he could go to Gringotts from King's Cross, and then use this public floo directory he got from the Ministry to get to within safe apparating distance from his home.

His expectations were very low. It was better to keep them that way, rather than get teased to the point of traveling beneath the surface with a goblin, going to a vault so deep it was guarded by more than stomach-heaving, twisting turns, only to open it and find it full of cobwebs and mouse corpses. Severus probably would not even get that far. A goblin would look at the papers, laugh, then call more goblins over and they'd all have a good laugh together, and slap each other on the back while tears streamed out their eyes. Then they'd go back to counting out Sirius Black's monthly allowance in towering stacks of galleons that covered a huge table.

*************************************

Regulus knew Kreacher was sworn to secrecy, but he knew the house elf his whole life. Kreacher still expressed an opinion whether something a secret or not. Kreacher was friendly to Regulus so he called him to Hogwarts for a chat. He had plenty to say about Slughorn. Even though Kreacher was only a house elf, Regulus commiserated with it, agreeing that Slughorn was not worthy to even set one of his filthy, shabbily shod, sweating toes in number twelve Grimmauld Place. Foul libertine taking advantage of his mother's grief. That Kreacher could understand. This overstuffed philanderer was going to break his mistress' heart after he preyed upon her good nature, and then would cruelly use and discard her. The cad! Reprobate! Vile seducer!

After Kreacher popped away reassured that Regulus loved his mother and was very concerned for her happiness and well-being, as any good son of the Most Noble and Ancient House of Black should do, Regulus sighed knowing a surly house elf was not going to dissuade Horace Slughorn. He barely noticed the little things, unless it was sprinkled on food.

Regulus had to go home for Easter because Barty was staying at Hogwarts to study. He was not going to follow his brother's example of mouthing off, slamming doors and hurling insults at everyone to get himself tossed out on his ear. If he played his cards right, Regulus stood to inherit everything. He was the only male Black of this generation because Cygnus only had girls, and only Narcissa remained. Cygnus was his mother's brother. He could get rid of Slughorn, or stand back and allow his mother to do something foolish to elevate his family above Regulus' in the family hierarchy.

He could not discuss the situation with his fellow Slytherins any more because it had gone beyond the amusing stage. His brother, Sirius, was already one of the top-ranked witless buffoons of this century, but now his mother might join him. Letting Slughorn take a student under his wing to elevate them so they in return could shower their bloated mentor with gifts was acceptable. The preteens and teens of Slytherin were appalled to consider that their Head of House could be laying wand to one of their recently widowed mothers. Walburga Black's only chance of retaining her good reputation was for the rumor to be put about that Slughorn slipped her a potion.

*************************************

Severus was sitting on the Hogwarts Express with Lily and Mary MacDonald. Although Lily had told him for months that things were not well between the two girls, he never doubted that Lily would not remain MacDonald's friend. Likewise, Lily would have to do something pretty horrible to have MacDonald give her up since she needed assistance. MacDonald's spellwork with her left hand was terrible, and her fake hand was klutzy.

The train had already departed the Hogsmeade Station when their compartment door opened. Regulus Black appeared displeased. He asked, "Snape, is there room in here?"

Severus knew with only three of them that left seats, but looked at Lily. She shrugged in response so Severus replied, "If you want to join us, Black, you can."

"Hmmm," was Regulus' only response as he threw himself into the seat next to MacDonald and opposite Evans. MacDonald was sitting opposite Snape, but had been conversing with Evans. He crossed his arms over his chest and looked out the inner compartment window to the passageway. Without Barty, this trip was unbearable. The other Slytherins were making jest of his mother and Slughorn. At least he could count on Snape not to tell mother jokes.

Mary and Lily saw Regulus as fresh meat to entertain them. Lily knew Severus was tired so she was trying to leave him alone in the corner, besides she would either be rubbing Mary's nose in the fact that Sev would talk to her, or inspire Mary to start chatting with Sev.

Lily left to join the other prefects and then took one walk the length of the train before returning to their compartment. Regulus was reading, and Mary was watching Severus doze. Lily did not think he was truly sleeping because there was no snoring or drooling, just occasional twitching while Phi was alert on the seat behind him.

After making a face at Mary, Lily tried to look at Regulus while pretending she was reading too. He looked too much like Sirius for Lily to think he appeared handsome. Not that the Black boys were not handsome in their own way, but Lily had seen Sirius pointing and laughing so many times, she knew how ugly he could be. Why was Regulus in Slytherin, and Sirius sorted into Gryffindor?

Eventually they reached King's Cross and the students were disgorged onto Platform 9 ¾ to find their families after they each bid their traveling companions a good holiday. Unlike the others, Severus nodded at MacDonald and grunted likewise to Regulus.

When Lily found her mother and Petunia, Severus said, "I'll see you tomorrow morning?"

"Where are you going?"

"I was going to go to Diagon Alley before I apparated home."

"What for?"

Reluctant to admit he had slight hopes that were about to be mangled and trampled by goblins, he replied, "Phi. I don't think Cheeri Owls is the best diet for her. I can also save by not paying train fare."

Mrs. Evans exclaimed, "Severus! I didn't know you'd be here. How are you?"

"Fine, Mrs. Evans."

He certainly did not look fine to her. His face was pitted with pockmarks. Lily had written about hers and that they were fading. Although her daughter's beautiful skin was marred, Severus' face was ruined.

Frowning at Lily, she explained, "If I had known you'd be home for Easter … oh darn. Vernon's staying in our guest room till Monday, but … maybe you can camp out on the sofa? Or better yet, the girls can share, and you can stay in Lily's room."

Petunia let out a horrified shriek at that idea. She didn't want her freak sister at home meeting Vernon, but her parents insisted. Vernon did not know about Lily's freakishness, and now filthy Snape was around too? Even if Lily could act normal for a couple minutes at a time, Severus Snape would not. She was also regretting her mother pressuring her into letting Lily into the bridal party. That was not a couple spots that concealer could handle. Her photos were going to be ruined.

"Stay? Did something happen to the house in Spinner's End?"

"You can't stay there alone overnight, Severus."

"I'm capable of staying on my own."

"He is seventeen, mother," Petunia said, forced to agree with her nemesis. She might even have enough money to give him plane fare to Transylvania, or wherever these freaks went for fun. Petunia did understand her mother's feelings due to both of his parents dying so it was a bit hard for her to unleash her full displeasure at him. His cratered face would probably bring tears to her mum's eyes too, and Petunia did not want to be in the line of fire when that started.

"I'm not saying you are incapable, but I'd feel better knowing you were alright, Severus."

"Doesn't that thing have a cage?" Petunia asked. Lily's owl stank, but at least it was decently confined.

"She doesn't need one because I'm not taking the train. I've got some things to do in London, and then I'll apparate, or make myself disappear here and reappear somewhere else."

Petunia liked the sound of the disappear part.

"Will you be back in time for dinner, Severus?"

Petunia audibly growled.

"I might, but I wouldn't want to intrude on Lily's first meal back. Also, the first time she's meeting Petunia's intended?"

"You can meet Vernon too, Severus."

"Maybe I should wait till any explanations are made, or does he already know?"

"Of course not," Petunia snapped.

"He'll have to be told someday," her mother speculated.

"We can see how it goes first," Lily suggested. She did not want to turn dinner into a magic show.

"I suppose I'll have to mention your friend too, if he's coming over," Petunia grumbled.

"Keep the explanation simple. He'll probably fill in the details for us," Severus proposed. "Also, don't make us sound too good at school because we study such different things."

Lily snorted. Petunia make them sound smart? What had Tunie told this Vernon about her already?

Mrs. Evans said, "If you get home and find it's a bit too much, Severus, please come over."

After he got crushed at Gringotts and found out he was killing Phi with Cheeri Owls, Severus considered he may feel that badly.

Reminding them of the time, Petunia warned, "We should hurry, or we'll have to wait for the next train."

They said their farewells with Mrs. Evans pestering Severus a bit more before they left.

Resolved that he might as well go to Gringotts, Severus was heartened that if it was abominably dismal, he could visit Lily this evening.

Severus apparated and after he took a short walk to the bank, was asked to wait by a goblin. When one of them finally got to him, he handed over the dozen sheets of parchment and allowed the goblin to read them over. After about ten minutes of studying them, the goblin asked Severus to follow him into an office.

Other goblins hovered about and pulled out books. Severus presented what keys he had, his mother's one, the one they recently mailed to him, and all the ones he found with the gobstones. They appeared to be looking at things. They were wasting a lot of time if they were going to laugh at them. Goblins would not care about hurting his feelings. If he was entitled to nothing, they should come right out and say it.

He was invited to take a seat, and a goblin presented him with a quill and ink to sign documents. They had revised the ones his mother had received.

Before signing, Severus asked, "What are the penalties for me assuming ownership of these vaults?"

"There are no penalties for inheriting a vault, Mr. Snape."

The goblin said his name in an odd manner, but Severus had never had someone address him with deference so he did not recognize it.

"Fees, taxes, some charge by the Ministry? And I assume Gringotts itself generates revenue from managing these vaults? Obviously from the lengthy amount of research here," Severus referred to the topmost document, "that Rufus Lestrange's younger sister, Elizabeth, married Uther Prince in 1806 and then had children, took time and effort on your part."

The goblins around him broke into wide grins. It was rare that a wizard acknowledged that they performed a service and should expect adequate compensation. The head clerk informed Severus, "We do accept tips, Mr. Snape. If you are pleased with our service, you may reward us with what you feel is fair. We are duty-bound to protect your assets as part of the bank's policy set forth by Gringott himself. It's only when the Ministry interferes and the bank is managed by wizards that mandatory minimum charges are incurred even for the smallest or simplest transaction."

Severus was skeptical, so asked, "So if these vaults are as empty as my mother's, I pay absolutely nothing?"

Although this wizard was overly cautious and seemed intelligent enough to realize that there is nothing absolutely free, the goblins were puzzled by how dim-witted he was at the same time. He and his mother were heirs to substantially sized vaults, and now inherited the Lestrange fortune.

"Although we do not pry into wizards' affairs and have no accounting of what is contained in these vaults, I hope you will be pleasantly surprised, Mr. Snape. If not, Gringotts would accept no money for troubling you with these matters."

"Could something to that effect be included in these documents? There is no clause regarding fees, either way."

The goblins revised both copies of each vault transfer document with wording stating there was no fee due to the bank. Then Severus signed them all, and received his copy of each.

Confident that their new client, Severus Snape, would be very pleased, the head clerk personally offered to take him to his vaults to inspect them. All the goblins in this room desired to impress upon Mr. Snape their names, in case he had any further needs, do not hesitate to ask for any of them.

Severus could not reconcile the behavior of these goblins to Prof. Binns' bloodthirsty goblins fighting for their rights against oppressive wizards. If they carried on in this subservient manner at the bank, it was little wonder that wizards got the wrong impression of them. Prof. Flitwick was part goblin, and Severus considered him to be one of the good staff members at Hogwarts. He was never belligerent.

He shrugged and allowed the goblin to lead him to the vaults in a cart. Severus did not know when this would all come crashing down around him, but the goblins at least did not stand around smirking, winking and jabbing each other with their elbows.

At the first vault, which the goblin described as 'modestly sized', it had only money in it. The head clerk was starting to believe this young wizard was mental. He kept repeating nonsensical questions about whether it was his to do with as he liked, and if he could touch or take any of it now. When he was a junior clerk, and was charged to bring inheritors of much lesser sums to vaults, the greedy witches and wizards would do bizarre things like strip off their robes and dive into a pitifully small pile of galleons.

This was not making sense to Severus. If his mother had a choice between eating an owl and accepting a large amount of money, she chose to eat an owl? She could have bought a whole farm of real chickens, or an owlery, if she preferred the taste of them.

It was then that Severus struck upon the true test as to whether this was his money. He took a double handful of coins and handed it to the goblin. If it was not his to give, the goblin would be bound not to accept it.

Perhaps this young man was a nutter, but he was the right kind of nutter for this goblin. Tipping a goblin before taking any for himself. It was a pity that this clerk could not remember his mother at all. She must have been an extraordinary witch to raise a wizard in this day and age with such impeccable manners.

Only at the first vault did Mr. Snape take any money for himself, but he tipped the clerk at each vault they inspected. The clerk began to discern the boy's derangement better. He was interested in the books, and asked numerous questions regarding how often he could come, and if it would be alright to consolidate the different vaults, rather than keeping them separate.

When they returned upstairs to outside of Gringotts' vaults, the wizard was still asking questions. The bank was very discrete about who their clients were and the contents of their vaults. He seemed worried about his change of status. Understandable since the three Lestranges and his own mother died within a week of each other. Four heirs to a fortune snuffed out in seven days. The goblins were very busy between He Who Must Not Be Named and all the wizards who were taking advantage of using him as a convenient excuse to eliminate their rivals. There were lots of tips to be made.

Considering that this wizard only expressed an interest in books, there was also the possibility he could become one of their very best customers. There were goblin made artifacts in his vaults. Perhaps he would not mind giving them back to their rightful owners? The head clerk would have to broach the idea with his superiors. However, he did perform the extra service of letting the young man know he should engage a solicitor. If anything happened to him, all the contents of these vaults would need to be assigned to the next heir, and make a lot of unnecessary work for the bank. If Mr. Snape would draw up a will, if anything unfortunate occurred, the individuals or institutions of his choosing would benefit. The head clerk already happened to have a short list handy of solicitors he recommended.

*************************************

Although Petunia's current worry was Vernon and the possibility of him running like hell as soon as he met her freak sister, her mother and Lily did bring her round to talking about everything that had been planned, in case Vernon stuck around. There were also the many lovely things Petunia had bought earlier in the day in London since she was forced to travel down to pick up Lily.

Lily thought they could play by ear the explanation of what she did at boarding school. Since her muggle education ended at such a young age, she had to concede that perhaps a learning disability would be believable. Though if the subject never came up, Lily saw no reason why they should have to volunteer that.

As they got closer to home, Petunia's nerves frayed even more. Perfect Lily was home. Her parents would overlook her face. Why couldn't she spend the holiday at that freak school of hers? Knowing how much Lily liked to be the center of attention and ruin everything, that's probably why that Snape boy was with her. Lily might behave herself in front of their parents, but her mum was going to be fawning over him because his parents had died, and he was more hideous now than he had ever been before. She had heard more than enough conjecture about Severus Snape in the past two months to last a lifetime. This was supposed to be a time leading up to the happiest day of her life. The two of them better not ruin it, or else.

*************************************

Severus stepped out of Gringotts with more money on him then was in his mother's vault when he first saw it on their trip to Diagon Alley years ago to get him ready for Hogwarts. They even exchanged some of it for muggle money. He expected to be pursued as a thief. People, even by accident, would not leave or give him money. When the goblins realized they made a huge mistake, would they ask him for this money back? It was after all their error that caused him to think it was his.

Perhaps one of these solicitors would write a document for him, clarifying he was not at fault for the bank's mistakes? Though if a goblin gave him these names, they would probably never participate in any actions against Gringotts, even if they were at fault.

At least he could afford things for Phi so he took her to the Magical Menagerie for a physical and to get a few things that were healthier than Cheeri Owls. Nothing ridiculous. The only extravagance he got for her was a small metal mirror. She was quite keen to possess it.

There was no heavy hand on his shoulder as he made the purchase, nor any Magical Law Enforcement waiting to pounce on him as he exited the store after spending that money.

Severus could buy new clothes. One of Slughorn's mottoes was that the clothes make the wizard. He could not imagine himself in silk pajamas and an embroidered dressing gown, wearing a waistcoat, tweed or pinstripes. Besides, wouldn't it be more efficient to mix up gallons of Gregory's Unctuous Unction? No one would care what he wore then. There was little he could do about his physical appearance so he'd still be his same ugly self, no matter what he wore. He could also make friends if he started throwing galleons around like Potter. Hmmm, like Potter … should he get a racing broom? What did he need a broom for? He could apparate, and had better things to do than chase after balls.

He passed the bookstore and was tempted, however there were so many new books in those vaults for him to read now.

The wizarding jeweler's did catch his eye, and Severus entered. He knew Lily did not want anything detracting from Petunia's big wedding, but it would not hurt to look. Besides, there appeared to be so much variety that whatever he chose would be all wrong. The singing and talking engagement rings were really annoying. Severus wouldn't want that chirping in his ear while he was trying to sleep. The salesman lost interest when he realized he was not going to make a purchase today. Without Lily to say what she liked? That would be a huge mistake.

Still thinking that a solicitor may be a good idea, Severus apparated to the Minsitry to see if there was a department where he could inquire for a list of wizards that practiced law. He could write a few to see if they'd be interested in what little business he had to offer them, and post them when he returned to Diagon Alley to trade his mother's books for other ones, after he looked through them and boxed them up.

*************************************

Mrs. Evans was happy to see Severus the next morning, and let him in as soon as he reached their back porch.

"I'll have tea ready for you in a moment, Severus. Please sit down."

"Thank you, Mrs. Evans."

"Was everything alright last night?"

"Fine."

"Do you need any help over there?"

He paused then replied, "I'd rather do it myself, if you don't mind. It's not bad, and I would rather not miss anything, if there's something to find."

"Well, you come over here if it gets too lonely. If you have any trouble figuring out how to clean something, I can help. Lily told me you can do all the magic you two want now, but some things could take a little elbow grease."

Severus made a face as she turned to pour from the kettle. What was elbow grease? Sometimes the inside crease of his elbows got a little sweaty. He wouldn't clean anything with that. A clean house? Maybe it was too early to make such a radical change at Spinner's End. He could live with gradually cleaner.

She brought him tea and a bowl of porridge. "There's different ways to tackle a big job. I prefer to work from the top down so all the dust and dirt that falls gets swept up off the floor."

What dust and dirt? There was none of that at the Evans.

"There's also working your way around a room, if it's over cluttered and such. Start at the door, and then choose a direction to head in and then you will circle around until you come back to the door."

Seeing as how she was waiting for him to say something, Severus replied, "I'm picking through things, rather than being organized and efficient. Maybe over the summer."

She was not happy with how things were being handled with Severus. Admittedly, Mrs. Evans was a bit overenthusiastic over keeping things sorted and clean. Lily's comment over Mrs. Snape being a poor housekeeper had her wondering what he had on his hands over there. There was also undoubtedly a feeling of being crushed beneath it since the school made so little of such a tragedy, leaving Severus to sort it on his own. Their lot kills a bunch of her kind, including his father, and from Lily said in her letter, by the time they bothered to tell Severus, his mother's obituary was already magically published in their bloody newspaper. They gave him a morning off of school, and since he had nowhere else to go, resumed classes after lunch. If she had known, Severus certainly would have been welcome here. A whole lot sooner too, since he missed his own father's funeral. Even if he was not one of their kind, he was a decorated war veteran and deserved to have his son informed and allowed to come home.

Since it was in no way Severus' fault, and Mrs. Evans did not want to upset him, she changed the subject. "I mentioned yesterday that Petunia's fiancé is staying a couple days. He's on vacation till Tuesday, so he'll be leaving on Monday. Lily finally met Vernon last night. He's aware that Lily attends a boarding school. Same as you."

"Me?"

"Well, you are Lily's friend, and we do expect you to come over while you are home too."

Severus nodded. That probably was not Petunia's idea. He suspected that she'd rather he stay far away, or if he did not live in Spinner's End, Lily hide out with him till this Vernon was gone.

"Vernon has not asked us why Petunia went to a different school than Lily, but it may come up."

"Has Petunia told him anything? We shouldn't contradict her."

"You wouldn't?"

"If one of us is not telling the truth, he'd probably believe Petunia. His first impression of Lily should not be that she's a liar."

"Petunia led Vernon to believe that Lily is not academically gifted."

"Alright. That might be best since Lily and I are not similarly inclined to show off non-magical knowledge."

"Like what?"

"Um, well I can understand a lot of old languages. Mostly written, but Lily does not take that course, or have a curiosity for original spell composition. The courses we have in common are off-limits subjects … for those outside of immediate family."

"Well, I'm sure you can guess Lily's not happy."

"Is it possible to hint that after he's part of the family that he can be let in on the secret, or he's the type that will worry over it incessantly?"

"I'm not sure."

"Does he get angry? There is the converse situation where once he does know, he might not like it, and hold Petunia accountable for not telling him in advance."

"It's possible he may be upset. I'll see what Petunia thinks."

"What about Petunia?" asked Lily as she came in, giving Severus a smile where he sat at the counter.

"Nothing, Lily. We were only talking."

"How's Phi?"

"Fine. I bought her some different food and a small mirror."

"A mirror?"

"She wanted it."

"Does your bird talk, Severus?" Mrs. Evans asked. There was a Vincent Price movie with a talking raven.

"No, but I can tell when she likes something."

"Lily mentioned you received her as a gift. Is she working out?"

"I guess," Severus said with a shrug. He still did not want a familiar, but Phi was alright.

"Is she inside your house now?" Mrs. Evans queried.

"No, she's out right now. I can call her when I head home."

Petunia ran into the kitchen, and hissed, "He's coming." She then glared at Severus.

Severus quirked an eyebrow at her and said, "Good morning, Petunia." What made her think that he'd interfere with this nonsense? Once Petunia was married, she was moving far away. That was good. Besides, she was moving away under favorable circumstances, so Lily would be pleased.

The fellow that entered the kitchen was not what Severus imagined. He expected someone rather Petunia-like. He was wide, muscular and had no neck.

Petunia showed the large fellow to a seat that would keep his back to Severus at the counter, and said, "My father should be down shortly, but we can start breakfast without him. Lily will be going out with her friend after she's done."

"Hmm?" Vernon looked questioningly at the distasteful looking young adult with long hair, huge nose and a badly pockmarked face at the counter. He looked out of place in the Evans' orderly kitchen.

"That's Lily's friend from school that I mentioned."

"Severus," Lily added.

"What kind of name is that?" Vernon asked.

"A Roman emperor," Mrs. Evans answered to the surprise of all. "What?" she asked, "I looked it up. Might come in handy if I'm ever a contestant on a game show."

Severus nodded. He did not want to spark Petunia's temper.

"May I sit on the other side?" Vernon asked. Petunia said her mother had taken an interest in this fellow years ago. Abused in some way, and her sister brought him home for a hot meal. He was poorly dressed so his fortunes obviously had not improved. His Petunia said he ate here frequently during school holidays because her mother felt sorry for him, in a good Christian way.

Lily was still staring daggers at Petunia. She had no plans to go out. She guessed they could go to Spinner's End, but Lily had not confirmed she was allowed there with her mum yet.

"Mum, um, what time did you want me home?"

"Can you two come back for lunch? We can take you for your fitting this afternoon, Lily, and maybe do something after that."

"Alright," Lily agreed.

Severus was distracted by Vernon. He could eat more than Lily. Luckily, Petunia liked to cook. Was that their mutual attraction?

He was disheartened by why Lily could be attracted to him. Black and Potter undressed him publicly, and within a couple months she's offering him a toothbrush. They were going to Spinner's End to shag next, weren't they?

They were. A short walk to Spinner's End, and then up the stairs to Severus' bedroom.

Lily was relieved that Severus did not fuss over taking every stitch of clothing off. Did he even realize how well lit his bedroom was in the morning? It could be better if the window wasn't so dirty, but Lily could take care of that later. She was going to be around here for a little over a week.

Rather than repeatedly demanding more, Lily took the opportunity to lay next to Severus and touched him before she went exploring. His fingers were still crawling lightly over her skin, but not in a sexual manner, even though Lily had returned to reexamine Severus there. The warmer weather did make his bollocks look like the illustrations. He also had small burn scars down there. She looked at his face. His eyes were closed. How could she ask?

She suddenly noticed that Severus had pink and blue toothbrushes on the washstand along with the almost full tube of toothpaste. If she hadn't been in such a hurry to get their clothes off, Lily may have noticed them before now. It would have been nice to brush their teeth together again. To start things, like they did … what felt like an eternity ago to Lily. Before dragonpox, a werewolf, Helen's murder, Christmas with Sev, and his parents also being murdered. As time went on, Lily grew more incensed over his mum. In her heart, Lily knew Sev would have taken care of his mother. She remembered those horrible weeks when it was likely Lily was a werewolf. Severus did not complain about it, he planned to help her and stay with her, unlike Mary's beau.

Sometimes it was simply better not to pay attention to what Lily was doing. Even though a large range of emotions played across her face when she played doctor with his cock, none of them was reassuring. Severus wanted to relax. He had gotten a surprisingly good night of sleep last night, and he felt much improved. Now Lily was with him, they were alone, and he was tracing the incredible way her skin felt.

Severus opened his eyes as Lily slid up his body. She hadn't bothered to get him hard. Was something wrong? She was looking at him. What had she not asked him about his anatomy now?

"Would you like to do anything in particular, Sev?"

"With you?"

"Yes."

"Whatever you want is fine, Lily," Severus replied.

"Surely there's something you'd like to do," Lily suggested, rubbing the front of his shoulders.

"Are you talking about shagging or something else?"

"Uh, how about something naked and together for this morning, and something else for either later today or tomorrow?"

"Alright. For this morning, do you mean you want me on top, or something new?"

"There's something new?"

"There's always something new. Use your imagination, Lily."

"How about I let you do the imagining this time?"

"Well, we can start with something different if you turn around." He then amended, "No, not on your back, turn so you are facing my feet."

"Your feet?" Lily asked. That sounded intriguing. Severus grabbed her hips and pulled her backwards. She was about to tell him that she could not reach his feet like this, when she felt him doing something with his fingers, then his tongue. She grabbed his thighs and wriggled her hips. Eventually, her knees weakened and slid out from under her. He stopped.

Severus rolled out from under Lily, and suggested, "If you are going to fall on me, we can try side by side, or me over you."

"I don't think that position was very good to start with."

"It's not, if you have no intention of reciprocating. You don't have to, I can do it like I've done it before."

"What do you mean?"

"Roll on your side. Now bend your leg like this, and I'll do the same."

"Oh!" Lily said in revelation as she realized what had been right in front of her. "I was looking at your feet."

"You expect me to believe that?"

"Yes, if I say it, you're to believe it."

"I believe I am not in the mood to keep doing this. Can we try it again later in the week?"

"Alright," Lily agreed, feeling a little foolish that she ignored Sev's naked thing inches from her face to look at his feet.

They resumed their regular face to face position and were content to look at each other's eyes till Severus suddenly thought of something. "Did you choose a different spell out of that book?"

"What book?"

"The one with the contraception spells?"

Lily gasped which was the only answer Severus needed as he cast the one-time spell at her.

"Will it work? Could I be pregnant right now?"

"The charm will probably still work since it's only been a short while. You do know that the chance for pregnancy overall is not likely? If we forgot the entire holiday week to cast a spell, the risk would be higher."

What if Petunia was as gifted at Divination as Lily? Oh no.

Severus saw the look of horror on Lily's face. "You were more likely to be a werewolf, Lily."

"What if I used up all my luck on that?"

"There's a book downstairs," he muttered. "Did you want to see it now, or wait till you think you really are pregnant? I won't pack it up with the others."

"You are packing up your books?"

"I've read them all, or at least looked at them. I did not study and commit the one I'm thinking of to memory."

"What's in it?"

"Different things. If I remember correctly it was a book of general knowledge regarding pregnancy. How to, and also keeping, saving, or getting rid of babies."

"Huh?"

"If you are, you don't necessarily have to have a baby in nine months. It can be put off."

"How do I get rid of it?"

"Rid of it for good? There's potions," Severus informed her. It was hurtful how quickly Lily could come to that decision, before she even determined if she was pregnant, without even looking at different options to delay a pregnancy. She wanted any possible child with him chucked out of her body. She'd naturally want beautiful children, like her.

"Can you go get it now?"

"Alright," he said, rising quickly since he needed to leave the room before he started crying like a simpleton.

Downstairs, he dawdled as he sniffed and wiped his nose and eyes on the back of his arm. He couldn't believe how stupid he was about Lily after all this time, and like an idiot he was looking at engagement rings yesterday. And now, his fucking clothes were all upstairs so he had to go back up there and in the room, rather than just lobbing the book through the door in at her.

Severus was in agreement that now was not an ideal time for this to possibly occur, but sometimes things happened for a reason. It was not prudent to immediately judge something as a disaster, unless lives were endangered. Like years ago when Severus was heart-broken over Lily getting sorted into Gryffindor, and the hat not listening to his pleas to be sorted with her. Lily in Slytherin? Severus in Gryffindor? Either one would have been the real disaster.

Lily impatiently waited upstairs. What was taking Sev so long? They could read it together. How could she have forgotten to cast that spell? She had even thought about it on the train yesterday. Lily had one picked out that would last a whole month or four weeks, whatever it was between periods. She could have cast it anytime before she came over here. If Severus hadn't thought of it, she could have been in for a terrible surprise. When would she have even noticed? By the end of the school year, or over the summer holiday?

He came back in, and Lily could not help but giggle. She sent Sev running downstairs naked. He held out the book with both hands for her to take it. It was big.

"Did you find anything in it?" she asked as she took it.

"I did not look."

"What took you?"

"I was um, barefoot and the floor's dirty," Severus replied as he started putting his clothes back on.

Lily rolled her eyes. Severus had some sort of hang-up regarding his feet. She got comfortable and opened the book to the table of contents. There were sections on preventing, assuring and determining pregnancy, before it went into the being pregnant chapters. She flipped to the section on getting pregnant and then advanced quickly through the pages to charms to determine success. Scanning quickly there were a lot of ways to increase fertility. Ah, here it was. "Found a charm for finding out if I'm pregnant."

Severus took the book when she thrust it at him to hold while Lily got her wand. She reviewed the spell, mouthed the incantation silently, then practiced the wand movement twice, before actually casting it at her midsection.

Lily squealed in delight, "Nope, nothing. Yippee!"

"I told you the chance was very slight," he groused, upset further by her jubilation. "I'll cast the charm on you from now on so we know it's done."

"But I found a better one that's good for a whole month."

"Did you cast it on yourself already?"

"No, I forgot. Sorry, Sev."

He closed the book. "Let me put this back. Maybe I'll stay downstairs and get back to what I was doing."

"We still have time," Lily suggested.

For another quick shag? Severus did not want another worthless, quick shag with Lily so he left. Making Lily happy was not working.

Eventually Lily came downstairs. She had not seen the parlor in its entirety before since it had always been dark. Severus had opened the curtain, however Lily noticed he had not cleaned the windowsill. He had a half dozen open wooden crates about him, and two shut against the wall, which was also another bookcase. There were hundreds, maybe thousands, of books in here.

"Why are you packing up your books?"

"Why not?" he responded lowly as he flipped the pages of his current book. So far, he had found nothing from his mother.

Lily frowned at him. Severus loved books. Was it because they reminded him of his mother? "Can I help?" she asked, hoping he'd give her some insight into why he was doing this.

"I'd rather not."

"Can I clean the floor and the rest of the room?"

"You shouldn't bother yourself with it."

"It's no bother, and it'll give me something to do. Petunia won't want us back early. Hey, do you think she shags Vernon already?"

"I hadn't noticed. Was she flatter?"

"Sev!"

"Does it matter if they are? They will soon enough, if they haven't."

"You got me thinking. He's so much bigger than her. What do you think that's like?"

"Eat more, and then I'll let you know."

"Come on, I'm trying to be serious."

"You want me to imagine Petunia and her fiancé?"

"Not specifically them, but what it's like with a big fellow."

"I'm sure they manage it somehow."

"But what about a big belly?"

"You aren't that high up on my body," Severus responded. This was such a pointless conversation, unless Lily was hinting at she wanted to gain sexual experiences with others.

Lily curled her lip. Would it be all doughy and mushy when she put her hands on it? Jiggle like crazy when she moved? Ugh. Lean men had to be better. Even in the dark, Lily bet she could feel the wobble. Shagging would make her sea sick.

She got rid of the dead flies. Sev should have at least done that. Sighing, she went behind him to see what book he was going through.

He was turning the pages too fast so she said, "Could you slow down, Sev?"

He closed it and held it up to her. "Why don't you take it, and read it at your pace?"

"Is something wrong?" she asked, not taking the book.

"Maybe I'll come back here after lunch to get a better start on this."

"Was it because I didn't realize you wanted me to use my mouth earlier?"

"No, that has nothing to do with it, Lily."

"Well, something's wrong with you."

"There's a lot to do here. If I don't get as much done now, it'll all be waiting for me when the summer holiday begins. Since you have things planned with your mother and Petunia, it would be a good time for me to make a dent in this."

"Why are you bothering to look through the books, if you've already read them? It'd be a lot faster to box them without paging through them."

Severus opened his mouth to reply and stopped. Lily would not care if he was wasting his time to find anything from his mother. He himself doubted there was anything, but he'd rather confirm it now, rather than keep wondering for years. He was a feeble minded blockhead that expected people to care for him so he was a complete buffoon searching for proof of that. Severus would continue to foolishly hope even after he had looked at every book here, and start looking under the tables and chairs, and perhaps rip open the worn, upholstered furniture.

Lily had thought her idea was sensible and efficient. However, Severus looked around at the books forlornly and tears formed in his eyes before he started crying. Without giving a thought for how dirty the floor was, Lily joined him on it. She took his hand and pleaded, "Take all the time you want, Sev. I didn't understand how you were going about this."

She had a sudden thought. There was the right amount of storage here for the books, why would he be packing them? Either the books or the house were going. If Severus was going to sell the house, the books would still be his. If he was selling the books, he was taking his time saying farewell to them. Besides the house though, they may be the only asset he had.

Severus removed his hand from Lily's. He didn't want her pity. Sitting on the floor pathetically crying … if his father was here, he'd give him something to cry about. This room was full of those kind of memories. He wiped his face on the sleeve of his jumper and took a deep breath.

"Oh, Sev," Lily exclaimed, and threw her arms around him.

He tried to get his arms between them to pry her off, but Lily had followed with the rest of her body. "Lily," he protested, "I'm not in the mood for this right now."

Rather than removing herself from him, Lily kissed him repeatedly while holding his head to fight him twisting his face away. "I'll help you, Sev. You don't have to do everything alone."

Sighing, he knew Lily did not understand the difference between together and alone. Shagging, even though they were together, did not mean they were together. Even with ensuring that he'd be the lover she always enjoyed and craved, Lily was still interested in trying other lovers, marrying someone else and having that man's children. To him, that defined being left alone, no matter how many times this week, or until they graduated, she screamed his name in ecstasy. It was unfathomable that he could find someone else to love the way he loved Lily. She was the one. By that very definition, there could be no other for him.

*************************************

After leaving Lily after lunch, Severus stopped at the market to buy some fresh food for him and Phi to eat later. He declined Mrs. Evans' invitation to dinner. He would have turned down lunch too, but she had an egg and cress sandwich already prepared for him. Severus could not be that churlish. The others were having roast beef with horseradish. She had a big, electric meat slicer with a fast-moving circular blade to cut the roast extremely thin. Mrs. Evans had all sorts of muggle gadgets.

Rather than going back to sorting through books, Severus spent time cleaning the parlor. The window was too clean now so he cast a charm that filmed up the glass so anyone outside could not see in, besides adjusting to the sun's brightness. He also tried the 'top down' way that Mrs. Evans mentioned. So much debris and residual dregs fell and drifted to the floor, that Severus chose to vanish a section at a time since it was over an inch deep in places. The furniture shed more detritus, in addition to what fell on it from above. Severus _scourgify_ed the entire floor multiple times because he did not believe once, twice or even three times would be enough. The rug was thin, faded, and seemed to actually become dust-colored, if there was such a hue. The wood boards underneath were also the same shade. The furniture had also absorbed the colorless tint. He could still make out the pattern in the area carpet and the leaf-life pattern that was printed on this chair so they had not completed absorbing the lifelessness of the room, or would the lifelessness of the room draw the color out of objects?

The parlor had not seemed this bad when he was a child. The curtain would be closed, and he and his mother would sit in here, with the kerosene lamp making it seem like there was no one other than the two of them. She'd teach him through stories or take out a book when he was older and understood more. They also were in the kitchen, at the table. The light was better for reading out there, and he could write at the table. As he got older, he needed less supervision during his lessons, so his mother preferred they were in the kitchen, since that is where she kept her Pimms. More convenient if she did not have to get up and try to walk.

Mother let him read whatever book he wanted, even the Dark Arts books. He looked at them fondly. They were his favorites. No one understood. There was using the Dark Arts, mastering the Dark Arts, and defeating those who thought they mastered the Dark Arts. The Dark Arts were powerful, deadly, and fascinating since it was constantly mutating as dark wizards tried to outdo each other with crueler atrocities. They wanted to create fear. Severus understood and compared the Dark Arts to fighting a many-headed monster. Defeat one head only to find that fiercer head has grown back in its place, or perhaps two heads instead of one. Indestructible.

If Severus wanted to protect himself against something seemingly indestructible and feared by most, he'd have to understand it. He spent a lot of time trying to understand what endangered him, and how to preserve himself. In most circumstances, he only had himself to rely on, but he was able to identify allies at times. Such as Potter in the Ministry. He was going to attack Severus simply because he was there. It was nothing new. Severus had evolved a defense against that threat over time. At first he would fight back, even ambush an opponent to try to instill fear in them, but when that proved fruitless, Severus would cast only benign things such as shields. He then gained Prof. McGonagall as a possible ally. Although it was true she held no real power at Hogwarts or any at the Ministry, if Severus was not mortally wounded by Potter and Black, there would be possible repercussions that he could benefit from. She was quite good at shaming those in authority to see Potter for the monstrous bully he was. After six years, Potter was expelled, and even his parents were doubting James Potter was absolutely the most perfect wizarding boy of all time who was maligned by all those jealous of him.

Other than McGonagall, Severus could only count a handful of others at Hogwarts as allies. Not steadfast allies through thick and thin, but ones who were able to accept the truth rather than lying and covering arses. Unfortunately the school was run by Dumbledore with Slughorn at his side. Without Slughorn, the headmaster seemed purposeless with his absent wanderings about the school. Nonetheless, Dumbledore was no friend of his. Dumbledore was also chummy with the Ministry, which was a bloated bureaucracy filled with those more interested in serving themselves than the people who paid their salaries. Severus saw what kind of students Slughorn handpicked to move into Ministry positions. If Severus told them altruism was a muggle religion, they'd believe him.

There was also a third quasi-organization, the Death Eaters and He Who Must Not Be Named. Even if one could neglect the rumor that his parents were a muggle and a squib, two of his most infamous followers were recently killed by Severus' father and his drinking buddies, followed shortly by Bellatrix Lestrange, who may have suffered grave injuries in that attack. Dark wizards killed by muggles with broken beer bottles? Not the finest moment for pureblood supremacy. Whichever way he looked at it, Severus could make no sense out of them attacking the pub. They were too far away from London and proper wizarding families for the The Daily Prophet to even report on it. Spreading fear only works if word gets out. Severus was sure it had something to do with Potter, Black and Pettigrew there last summer, but he could not imagine any of those three having the influence to convince He Who Must Not Be Named that it was a worthwhile target. Pettigrew was dead. Sirius Black was screwing his way across Europe. So that only left James Potter. The coincidence of him being at the Ministry to take his apparition test, conveniently scheduled for Lily and Severus on Potter's seventeenth birthday, might mean something. However, the dunderhead only bothered Lily for a kiss, and said nothing to him at all about his muggle father.

The bizarre thing about it was that he was given access to the family vault of his father's killers. Their vault was huge and full. Was it anything like the Black or Potter vaults? There were a few vaults that were guarded by that imprisoned dragon in the deepest level of Gringotts.

Severus could only conclude he had more enemies than he could imagine, and no idea what most of their reasons would be to harm him, except the old standby that Severus deserved it because he exists. He could use the Dark Arts to make others fear him so the bulk of them might leave him alone to find easier targets. These books did not contain the perfect plan to accomplish that. Bringing someone back from the dead as a mindless zombie slave? Would anyone notice a difference in Potter's or Black's behavior if he did that? Splitting his soul into pieces to live forever? Severus would like to live, but forever would get tedious. If Lily was not living forever, he could not see the point, especially the warnings about the damaged soul making the wizard inhumane. Lily was not attracted to inhumane. Though if Lily was going to find her husband soon, Severus might want to consider the benefits of delving deeper into the Dark Arts. He would no longer care. Obviously caring that Lily loved him and wanted to be with him was a huge problem from the amount of sniveling he did earlier today. Not caring was better than the pain Lily was going to cause him.

Not just any spell would do. It would have to be significant and symbolic. He had the vial of blood he collected from Lily when he took her virginity. With her _confunded_, it seemed a pity to let it go to waste, even though he had no idea what he'd use it for. He needed to look at more books. His mother had very little on the blood magic branch of the Dark Arts. When Lily looked at him with that happy grin and her eyes shining brightly to blithely tell him of the perfect wizard she intended to marry, he would be ready to prevent his suffering. He was weary of constantly being in pain.

*************************************

Coming out of his pensieve, Albus had known, he had only forgotten. Miss Evans had told him at St. Mungo's about Eileen Snape - "She's unwell, and never leaves the house."

It had been quick in the middle of other conversation with Lily Evans. Albus then, and still now, was trying to figure out why Severus Snape was important. Cursed with dragonpox, set upon by a werewolf, nearly crushed by a large stone here in the castle, and his father killed by Death Eaters in the middle of nowhere. Tom was definitely behind the last attack. Likely that he was also responsible for the first three as well?

Most of the staff agreed that Severus had moments of brilliance. Horace was blind with regards to his own Slytherin, but he was the only student Argus mentioned positively. Very odd. Without Horace's assistance, who would aid Severus after he graduated? Did he even want assistance? If Tom had not had his father murdered, Severus may have been susceptible to Tom offering him assistance. Perhaps the original plan was to have the Lestranges quietly murder or destroy that pub, but they got carried away with themselves?

What was he to do? Playing favorites created bullies like Sirius Black and James Potter. At this point, Severus was not likely to accept his favor. He had done him a horrible disservice.

*************************************

Phi woke Severus up. It was morning. A bright morning. She indicated the window so Severus looked out and down. Mr. Evans and Lily were at the front door. Why? Phi did not know.

He opened the window. It took magic since the window preferred not to be open. "What?" Severus asked.

"Are you alright, Sev?" Lily called up.

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"Can you come down and open the door?"

He slammed the window shut. Muttering to himself as he went downstairs that Lily could no longer be bothered saying 'please'. How many sodding times had she told him that he had to say it? And what were her and her father doing here? Spinner's End in springtime was a must see? The Whomping Willow was nicer looking and was a hell of a lot less dodgy.

Severus opened the door, and stood blinking at the light. He repeated, "What?"

"What were you doing?" Lily asked.

"Sleeping."

Lily noticed that once again Severus was mostly dressed and had on work boots. He was only missing a jumper over his braces and one of his disgustingly old undershirts. Why did he still have that?

Cutting through the juvenile banter, Mr. Evans interrupted, "Lily was worried when you did not show up for breakfast, Severus. May we come in?" Standing on the doorstep, even when the street appeared deserted, still left him with a feeling of being watched.

"I suppose," Severus said, getting out of their way. He used his wand to light a kerosene lamp since he was not ready for sunlight yet. "Isn't today a church day? I don't eat at your home on church days."

"Not till later, Sev. Good Friday isn't till the afternoon."

"Huh?"

Mr. Evans was looking around the dimly lit room. It was almost a decent sized parlor, but the bookshelves covering every wall made it seem smaller and close. The stacks of wooden crates also took up room. The few spots of wall and the shelves that were bare had no electrical outlets, and there was only a second oil lamp in this room. The furniture was threadbare, along with the dull rug that covered most of the floor in here. Even when he was a child, he lived in a house with electricity. His grandfather talked about gas lamps, but that was during his childhood, and he explained that the electric wiring was put in when the gas pipes were removed, except for the kitchen stove.

Lily was looking at all the packed crates. If Severus reviewed every book before he packed them, he must have been up all night.

Mr. Evans jumped. He thought he was looking at a stuffed bird, but then the crow or whatever it was turned its head and looked right at him. It let out a cry.

Severus answered it, "Alright," and opened the door for it to leave.

"Why don't you go get dressed and come back with us, Sev?"

He did not want to, but now that he was awake, his plans for a second good night's sleep were ruined. Severus had packed up enough that he had plenty of room to bring books back with him, and he had written a few letters to inquire about a solicitor that he planned to post today. He could go this afternoon, and go to bed early tonight. Doubtful. He'd want to look at those new books. Maybe a nap instead of lunch?

Severus looked at Mr. Evans and replied, "I guess if you went through the trouble of coming here to fetch me, I'll come over for a bit."

He opened the door that had yet another bookcase on it, and closed it behind him before going upstairs to fetch a jumper.

Mr. Evans circled a bit before opening the only other visible door. Lily was hissing, but he had to agree with Mrs. Evans that even though Severus was self-reliant and independent, those that should have done something failed. The wizarding sort were callous, cruel and apparently thought his muggle sort were beneath them entirely. Could not even be bothered to allow a son to pay his last respects to his father.

The kitchen … he stepped into the room. Mrs. Evans had expressed some concern about this house, but she never would have imagined this. Lily had been here last summer.

Lily had followed, continuing her displeased warning, "Don't go in here. This is where his mother died."

Right, Mrs. Snape. His wife mentioned that Lily said she drank and did not keep house well. This was not a few cocktails. She concealed the truth from them. Why? So Lily could practice magic here? She preferred this because she could do magic? "You are in a lot of trouble, young lady."

"Me?"

"Yes," he said, turning around to return to the parlor.

"It's not Severus' fault."

"Why would I hold Severus responsible?" The son is not his parents' keeper, or at least not at this age. It's the parents' duty to teach their children right, and at some point Lily became a prevaricator, stretcher of truth, and probably a liar. What else did she conceal from them? Did she even realize that Severus' health was endangered by this environment? It wasn't as if Mrs. Evans kept quiet about that. She had never seen him without long sleeves, that was for certain. That burn looked like a nasty one.

Severus returned to the parlor after cleaning himself up a bit and putting on a jumper. Lily was pouting. Mustn't keep Princess Lily waiting. It wasn't his fault that he didn't know what time they went to church today. All the rest of the time they went sometime in the morning, and did not eat till later. Lily called that her family day during the summer, and told him not to come over on Sundays. Additionally, he had never told her to expect him over this morning. She only heard what she wanted to hear.

"Do you need to wait for your pet to return, Severus?"

"No, Mr. Evans. She's as capable as a wild raven, even though she is domesticated. I could call her to follow me, but with Petunia's Vernon over, that would be too peculiar."

Lily's father nodded his agreement. Vernon already saw Lily's owl in its cage. Called it a 'damned odd pet'.

Lily's gaze lingered on the crates of books. By Monday, all of them could be packed. She hadn't even gotten a chance to look through them herself. Maybe her parents could loan Sev some money and hold the books till he paid them back?

All three of them were quiet as their own thoughts kept them busy till they got over to the Evans home. Mrs. Evans had tea for all three of them, and gave Severus a plate of toast along with a bowl of porridge. "Alright, Severus?" she asked.

"Yes, Mrs. Evans. I hadn't understood what Lily had told me about her schedule today. I thought you were going to church in the morning."

"That's fine and don't worry. Today's going to be rather long, but would you like to come with us on Sunday? They really decorate nice for Easter," she suggested. She understood Severus only knew the barest basics from her family, but if there was someone who needed help, hope and faith, it was Severus.

"Won't that cause trouble?"

"Everyone's welcome. There's one part where you won't participate. You won't look out of place because of portion of the congregation remains seated."

"But my attire? Lily says she dresses in her best clothes."

"Maybe your uniform slacks and shirt? Men don't dress as fancy as ladies."

Mrs. Evans seemed keen on him going to church with them. He wouldn't know what to do. It could be humiliating. Lily had left the kitchen with her father, so he was alone with Mrs. Evans and he couldn't tell her 'no'. Why wasn't Petunia nosing around? She'd probably have over a hundred reasons why this was a bad idea and be happy to share her opinion. "If it's alright with Lily. I wouldn't want to intrude on what she considers her family time."

"That's nonsense, Severus. I'm inviting you."

"Lily can still get upset with me."

"Pish tosh. I'd also like you to stay for Easter dinner with us."

That was easy for Lily's mother to say. Lily never thought to invite him to church before so he doubted she'd want him there now. If he had to spend Sunday with the Evans, he was going to lose another day that he could go to London.

He was finishing with his breakfast when Lily stomped into the kitchen. "Mum, dad wants to speak with you in the lounge."

She walked over to the counter where Severus was with her mouth screwed up. Lily looked over her shoulder to see her mother leave before she sulked, "I can't go over to your house for the rest of the holiday."

Severus shrugged, "The reason you came over was to practice magic. You can do that here now, as long as Vernon's not in the room."

She whinged, "But Sev …"

"I doubt I can convince your parents otherwise."

"I'm grounded."

"You are?"

"Dad's talking to mum about you right now."

"Me? What did I do?"

"Nothing. I kind of glazed over the truth, and I'm in trouble."

"Should I go?"

"No, stay. At least for now. I think my dad wants to talk to you."

"Did you say something about us?" Severus asked. Had he misunderstood yesterday?

"No, of course not."

"Oh," he replied, hoping he betrayed nothing. He busied himself by taking his dishes over to the sink and washing them in the soapy water. Severus was not going to cry today. He got it out of the way yesterday, and that only happened because he needed sleep. Every sign had been there all along that Lily would never marry him.

"Severus, I would have gotten them," Mrs. Evans admonished lightly as she came back into the kitchen.

"It's no trouble, Mrs. Evans. I threw off your schedule enough with being late," he apologized.

"Nonsense, you didn't know."

"Did the gown try-on go well yesterday afternoon?"

"No. Well, never mind, we're fixing it," Mrs. Evans replied, suddenly overcome with emotion.

Lily explained, "The style is just straps on the shoulders, Sev. Thin ones, so where Lupin attacked me is visible."

"Didn't you write about that?"

"I didn't say how big."

Severus made a face at Lily, "They're significant in size, and cursed. They won't fade."

"I know."

"If bare shoulders is a typical style, why wouldn't you say something?"

"Not you too, Sev. Everyone's against me."

"I'm not against you. I just don't understand you."

"You don't understand me? If anyone should understand me, it's you, Sev. My shoulders are nothing compared to all the scars on you."

"I say something. When you spoke about us apparating to take some seaside holiday, I told you I would not wear a swimsuit."

"You didn't say why."

"Why should I have to? That's why I don't understand why you could not have said something in advance that you would not be comfortable baring your shoulders."

"They would have thought I was being trouble."

"Finding out now has to be more inconvenient."

"It's not, really," Mrs. Evans interrupted. "There's little jackets they could wear. They'll all have them on in church, and later, Lily will keep hers on."

"Maybe I won't," Lily replied sulkily. "Sev's used to them. Maybe everyone else should get used to them too."

"Severus?" Mrs. Evans queried. Lily's school uniform was concealing, and Severus kept himself covered up, even in summer. How did Lily … well, she could have found out without her friend and her doing something inappropriate. They both spent time in hospital this year, and Severus was with Lily when her shoulders were torn apart.

"Hmm," Severus looked at Mrs. Evans. Was Lily choosing to let their secret out during an argument with her mother? "I won't be there. With it being Petunia's wedding, I think it best to leave the decision up to her. She'll love you scars or not, however, she'd rather the attention be on her. What kind of gown did she select? Does it also have bare shoulders?"

"It's white, with some sheer fabric on the very outside of her shoulders," Mrs. Evans explained while gesturing to her own.

"With the three of you having the same gracefully long neck, Petunia may have thought a style without frills or whatever in the middle would also look well on Lily? Perhaps with a simple necklace if the front is low cut?"

"We certainly could have used your opinion yesterday, Severus. Do you have anything positive to say about the color pink?"

"It's feminine."

"Oh shut up, Sev. Since when did you ever agree with Petunia? She's not even in the room."

"That's the only time I can agree with her," he laughed. "She'd faint otherwise."

"Oh ha ha. It does not suit me at all."

"It's too late now, Lily," Mrs. Evans said with a hard edge in her voice. "Decisions had to be made without you, and it's your sister's wedding. Be happy for her, or God help me ..."

Severus rolled his eyes towards Lily. It was a little late for the Evans to try to make Lily less self-centered. He wondered if it would take her long to accidentally do some magic in front of Vernon.

"I am happy for her. Gosh!" Lily disputed.

"If you have things to resolve, I can go. What time should I be here on Sunday, Mrs. Evans?"

"Sunday!" Lily exclaimed.

"Or not," Severus offered.

"I invited Severus to come with us to church for Easter, Lily."

"What?"

"I don't ..."

Mrs. Evans interrupted, "Be here at nine, Severus. Lily's attitude will be better then. Also be prepared to stay all day for brunch and dinner."

"But mum ..."

"Can it, Lily."

Severus stood and offered, "Good bye, Lily. Good bye, Mrs. Evans."

"Wait!"

"What?"

"What about tomorrow?"

"What about tomorrow?"

"Can't you come over?"

"I'll be over all day Sunday. I can do a lot between now and then, and if Vernon's only staying till Monday, you can get to know him."

"That sounds perfect," Mrs. Evans agreed. "You have Severus all next week, Lily. No need to be rude and disappear while Vernon's here."

"Well, doesn't Sev need to get to know Vernon?"

"Sunday may be enough for the both of us," Severus quipped.

*************************************

Horace Slughorn was still wooing his mother, or pretending to do so to eat everything in the house. He planned to spend the whole bloody holiday at Grimmauld Place with her. Along with Regulus and Kreacher. Regulus wrangled an invitation to Easter dinner out of uncle Cygnus. He'd try to find out if Cygnus cared one way or the other if his sister was taking up with a Hogwarts teacher.

Unfortunately Kreacher would not allow Regulus to hex him to projectile vomit in front of his mistress. Regulus only cast it on himself once, and that would be the last time. It hurt, damn it.

If Slughorn knew everyone that was anyone, what was his weakness? Foreigners? Regulus did not know of more than a handful of them. Nobodies? What could a nobody do? Irritate Slughorn. Unless he ignored them. That might get his mother thinking her Horace was totally devoted to her and couldn't take his eyes off of her. If it was an obviously irritating nobody, his mother would get angry at Regulus for inviting him, rather than at Slughorn.

It wasn't until he was at the table with the two of them when his mother inquired after his school chums that the ideal candidate presented himself. Barty was more than acceptable since he was in the Slug Club, like Regulus, and was a Crouch which was not a Black, but a decent enough family. Slughorn said the name first – Snape. He did not name him as unsuitable for being a half-blood, but called him a talentless hanger-on who was looking to make connections in all the right places and was negatively influencing innocent little Regulus.

Regulus took umbrage with being called innocent, but rather than defending himself, he went on the offensive on Snape's behalf. Order of Merlin, saving other students from a werewolf, Special Services to the school, and published original work in The Practical Potioneer. He also helped younger students, such as Regulus, with homework, and with the death of both his parents, Regulus felt perhaps he ought to extend an invitation to the poor fellow for next weekend.

Slughorn sputtered, but Walburga immediately zoned in on the questionable factor. Snape? She knew no Snapes. That was not a wizarding name. So there was no invitation to have his fellow Slytherin sit beside him at this table and cause Slughorn indigestion with his presence, but Regulus may have found a weakness. The question was how could he utilize it. As his mother said, Snape was not a wizarding name. He was no one.

*************************************

Severus arrived at nine on Easter Sunday, wearing his black trousers and a white, button-down shirt.

Lily was annoyed for the past two days, but not at one person in particular. Severus could have stayed Friday, or come over yesterday. Her parents were displeased, but Lily did cause that herself by not telling them the complete truth about Spinner's End. Vernon was not interesting, and Petunia was acting like she was replaying Princess Anne's wedding.

The wedding was so stupid. All the nitpicky little details, and now Lily had to have tea with the other pink gowned idiots next weekend. They were Tunie's old school chums that Lily knew when they were younger.

Petunia's eyes widened when she saw Severus Snape enter from the kitchen. They were about to go to church, and he was dressed nice, for him.

"What are you doing here, freak?"

He quirked his eyebrow at Petunia. Was she supposed to use such terms of endearment in front of Vernon?

"I asked him to come with us," Mrs. Evans explained. "Behave yourselves."

"Won't he burst into flames as soon as he sets foot inside a church?"

Lily rolled her eyes and replied, "I don't."

"Why would he do that?" Vernon asked.

Mr. Evans frowned at Petunia, "It's her idea of a joke. That little boy in The Omen reminded her of how Severus used to look when he was small, except the haircut."

"Yeah, wouldn't want a barber finding the 6 6 6 on his head."

"Come along," Mrs. Evans said, hustling them to the front door so they could walk the few blocks to the church the Evans attended.

Lily's parents walked arm in arm, Petunia and Vernon held hands, and Lily and Severus trailed behind, not touching the other.

Overall, Severus was not sure what he was doing. There were some looks, most especially Petunia's disappointed one when he survived entering the building. No one called him any names at all. The seats were not comfortable, there were smells all around him, they did not follow along in the book in a logical order, they sang, they stood, they sat, they knelt and finally lined up for something, but Mrs. Evans told Severus to remain seated.

The fellow up front did most of the talking. The bulk of it seemed to be expected, since it was in the book. Severus was not sure of his correct title. Did priest cover all of them, or was it reverend, father, brother, friar, vicar, monsignor, monk or probably something he never heard of before?

The building itself was pleasant inside, and Severus spent some time trying to see all the windows. When he had passed this building from the outside, he had not realized each one had a different picture. There were lots of flowers in the front, including lilies. He liked what one of the workers was wearing. It was all black with a lot of buttons, covered in the same black fabric. It was unpretentious, but Severus felt it commanded a degree of respect.

The whole ceremony was not unbearably long, and as they exited, Petunia splashed some of the water in a small basin at the door at him, and was immediately reprimanded by both her parents.

Vernon joked, "I guess that proves you aren't a vampire."

Severus looked at Lily. Had they discussed magical beings with him?

Lily was growing pleased with how the day was going. Petunia was earning her parents' ire with her immaturity towards Severus. Twenty years old and going on two.

When Lily took his hand on the way back, Severus was confused. Or more confused. Was it because he had not done anything odd this morning? On Friday, it sounded as if she did not want him with her family on Easter. He felt he always had good behavior around her family, except Petunia, but he had changed it to provoke her, while appearing he was being cordial to her. If he acted like a jackass, Mrs. Evans would not offer him tea and things to eat, or allow him in the house to see Lily.

When they returned to the house, the gentlemen were asked to be seated while the ladies laid out the brunch. Brunch? Breakfast and lunch combined. Why did it need a special name other than early lunch? If it was as good as the Evans' tea, he wouldn't mind what they called it.

The other blokes talked about the weather, Severus nodded his agreement that the ladies were dressed nicely, and then they talked about sports until Mrs. Evans called them into the dining room.

There was a lot of food. Out of all of them, Vernon seemed the most delighted, and between sampling everything was full of praise.

Severus was seated opposite Petunia. It was probably intentional to keep him from sitting across from Vernon. There was enough things in the center of the table to keep her from looking at him, besides having the company of her intended, right at her elbow. Vernon bumped it plenty of times while he ate.

By the end of the meal, Severus considered Vernon was not so bad. He talked plenty while he ate, but he expressed genuine appreciation for the meal, and he did not talk about himself much or who he knew. Maybe that had been covered in earlier conversations with the Evans. He was entertaining the others with stories. Unfortunately, Severus did not understand the context of muggle life enough to know why someone from Japan playing golf should be funny, which was the basis for his last tale of humorous misfortune.

After brunch, Mr. Evans corralled Severus on his own for a talk when he tried to follow Lily. She was helping her mother clean up, while Petunia went for a walk with Vernon.

Severus hid his nervousness with respectful silence. He knew Lily was in some sort of trouble with her family over him. Had she confessed everything? Had she blamed him? They were her family, and they should believe her before him, so if there was any inconsistencies with what he was about to be accused of, there was little use fighting it.

"You've been almost silent all morning, Severus. Everything alright?"

"Yes. New place and a new person. You are all doing such a good job with Petunia's Vernon, that I don't want to be the one to mess it up with a bunch of crazy wizard talk."

Mr. Evans laughed, "I've hardly heard you do crazy wizard talk, unless you count knowing the Latin names of some of my garden plants."

"Hmm," Severus agreed. He hardly talked in front of Mr. Evans. He was not a strict man like his own father, but Severus would prefer not to find out. Mrs. Evans encouraged Lily and him to act like she wasn't there and claimed she was interested in wizarding things. She was understanding of some of the traditional inconveniences like Lily having an owl familiar.

"We're worried about you."

"I'm fine."

"Did you really save Lily's life?"

"Yes, but I was in danger too so it's not like I was Sir Galahad or something."

"A werewolf?"

"Yes, it was very messy."

"There wasn't a way to kill it?"

"Yes, but it's illegal. The plan to trap us in there had multiple outcomes. We could have been killed by the werewolf. We could have killed the werewolf, and then faced a lifetime of prison. We could have ran, and the werewolf could have followed us to the village to kill others, which would have been our fault. There was also a slight chance that any of us could have been bitten and lived till morning. It tore apart its first victim, and the second victim was bleeding to death when we found her and interrupted it."

"A plan?"

"Yes, maybe not so well thought out at first, but effective. Only the actual werewolf was punished. The person who tricked us is wealthy and untouchable. The people in charge of taking care of that werewolf while he's dangerous know people in government so they weren't held responsible. The dead girl's family is still trying to cause trouble. The family of the girl that got her hand bit off and turns into a werewolf now is afraid to do anything for her sake since she's vulnerable."

"Not so much different from the corruption on this side," Mr. Evans commented. "Well, as you can guess, we do feel we should help you out if we can."

"I don't understand."

"Lily's worried about you selling your books."

Sell his books? He remembered that day quite well, and had replayed it in his mind many times since then. He never said he was getting rid of his books. If he was going to sell his books, what did it matter to Lily? They were his. "Why?"

"If you are strapped for money to finish your schooling, perhaps I could lend it to you. We could store the books here, if that would make you feel better about collateral till you could pay me back."

Severus considered what Mr. Evans was suggesting. If Severus was desperate for money, this may be the only way he could acquire it. Since he wasn't, or at least until the goblins sobered up, a loan while holding his books for collateral did not sound like the unending generosity of a man whose daughter's life he saved. Severus would have saved Lily without any kind of thanks, and actually had to listen to Lily whinge about her life debt on multiple occasions which was no thanks at all.

"I don't think that will be necessary, Mr. Evans."

"It would not be charity."

"I understand that," Severus replied. Why would he consider a loan charity?

"Perhaps you need some time to think it over?"

"Maybe," Severus conceded, since Mr. Evans did not appear ready to hear 'no'. "By the way, is there such a thing where a person pays a small amount of money to get some sort of death settlement? Life insurance?"

"Yes, it's not much money for younger people since they are less likely to die."

"How do they figure that? About a dozen Hogwarts students have died since we started. Most of the time, it's over the holiday, but two while in attendance this year. That may be under one percent, but if each of us paid one sickle for this insurance, that would be less than twenty galleons collected per year, but how could a company afford to pay out hundreds for each death?"

"The werewolf?"

"He got one of them, almost two if we count the girl that was bleeding severely because he bit off her hand. Then another boy disappeared, but he was always out of bounds so I don't think they ever figured out what happened to him."

"Even if he was out of bounds, wouldn't they look for him?"

"I think they did, but the castle's huge. They weren't even sure he was still in the castle when they realized he was missing the next day sometime."

"Isn't there a bed check?"

"Not really. We are supposed to be in one of our four houses by curfew. There's a lot of room in them because they could have up to maybe a hundred students, in the common room, the lavatories, baths, actual dormitory rooms, or they could be somewhere else. Like I have detention every night starting at curfew."

"What for?"

"Because a staff member wanted to give it to me. My head of house doesn't care so I'm stuck with it. The caretaker's a bit of a character, but we get along alright."

"That doesn't sound right."

Severus shrugged. He didn't care, and got tired of Lily telling him what he should do about his detention. At least Mr. Filch cared about him. Not as much as he cared about Mrs. Norris, but Severus did not require a minimum commitment from anyone. If he did, he'd have no one. "Well, neither does life insurance to me," he said to redirect the conversation back to his original question.

"I have it through work, besides an extra policy from when I first married. Your father?"

"It was in his employer's paperwork."

"There's probably a delay since no one knows where you go to school or who your guardian now is."

"What guardian?"

"You're only seventeen."

"Yes, that's old enough for an apparition license and everything else."

"For us, it's eighteen."

"So I need to wait till I'm eighteen to request it?"

"No, it's still yours, but if your age is known, that could cause a complication."

"Complication? I'd rather wait the nine months till I'm eighteen then."

"It's no bother, especially if you need the money now."

"It's no bother to wait either." It would also be a backup for when the vaults were closed to him. If one of those solicitors answered positively, he could inquire about the muggle age to perform his own transactions. Severus did not want to invite any complications. He was having difficulty enough already.

Mr. Evans did not think Severus had a good grasp of the value of money.

Severus was disappointed. Apparently Lily had told him nothing, except that she thought he was selling his books. It did fit in with their previous discussion that Lily wanted nothing to detract from Petunia's wedding, other than Lily not agreeing with what she was to wear and threatening to flash her werewolf scars at everyone. He did not like that she drew his appearance into that argument with her mother. His ugliness had nothing to do with Lily's gown for the wedding. He perfectly understood how they felt. Severus loved Lily, and the injuries to her shoulders did not matter to him. They wouldn't to her family either, but she should not have misled them into thinking they were hardly noticeable.

Lily became impatient when Severus and her father were spending too much time together. Sev wasn't going to do something stupid like ask her father for her hand in marriage? He had a house, of sorts, and from what she understood a bride's family usually matched the property with a dowry. Mary was polluting her mind! However, she had no idea what Severus could think up. With money problems, that might strike him as a way to raise cash instead of selling his books. Lily started to pace at the thought of Severus thinking her father would pay to have his younger daughter taken off his hands. What an asinine toerag idea! Going behind her back, when she would not say 'yes', and ask her father directly. Petunia might laugh so hard, she'd end up in hospital.

Unable to take it any longer, she crept closer to the door and overheard Severus say, "It's no bother to wait either."

What's that mean? The suspense grew as the men became quiet. What were they contemplating waiting on? And why would it be no bother to Severus? Men! Lily barged in before they did something stupid.

"Well?" she asked.

"Well what?" her father replied.

"You didn't miss anything," Severus drawled.

"What have you been talking about all this time?"

"Not you," Mr. Evans explained. Sometimes his youngest could be a real handful.

*************************************

Rita reread her article. It was going nowhere because it lacked something. Poor boy, ugly through neglect and illness. Mistreated by those who should have his best interest at heart. Smart despite that, including now some potions work published. She left out the part about eyeballs because the sad thing was supposed the be the boy, not those caterwauling birds. Saves other students at great personal risk, again due to the same incompetents in charge of the school.

Muggle father killed by Death Eaters, and no question about it that the Lestranges were all Death Eaters, with this muggle photograph of the Dark Mark above the pub. Something was in that, and how the Ministry and Prophet knew only what the muggles told them. How did his mother die? Broken heart would be nice for Witch Weekly, but Rita didn't believe in that sort of bunk.

She needed to get into the school to do interviews, maybe that would unearth a new angle, or track down Snape himself. Maybe he'd talk now that he had further misfortune and might be willing to point a finger or two.

*************************************

As they went up to go into Lily's room for a bit, her mother yelled after them, "Don't you two stay up there all afternoon, your father wants to play cards."

Severus made a face at Lily, asking, "Do I have to?"

"It's no big deal. We'll teach you any games."

Games. He might as well since Lily wouldn't want him reading at her house, and Mrs. Evans rather do things on her own in the kitchen. Severus knew he was kind of clueless around all those kitchen things, but he got the impression that Lily's mother thought that males were worthless unless they were repairing one of those devices. He was supposed to be learning how to cook things the way Lily liked them, especially meats, gravy and other sauces. If her mother would not show him, perhaps some Hogwarts house elves could show him the basics so he did not make her sick. Lily would not be impressed if he boiled flesh till it was a tasteless and colorless lump, even if all the invisible germs were dead.

Lily closed her bedroom door, and backed up against it with a mischievous smile. "I don't need to teach you anything in here though."

"What?"

"You know … a lit-tle hank-key pank-key," she replied, strolling towards him and shaking her hips.

"There's four other people in the house, Lily. We can't cast a silencing spell because if they call you, they'll expect a response."

"I mentioned that we'd be up here doing magic."

"Aren't you already in trouble?"

She tsk'd "Sev," before flicking her wand, and disrobing herself entirely from the waist up.

Severus looked at the closed door, and decided to ward it before he started kissing Lily. Lily responded by opening her mouth and rolling her shoulders back to thrust her chest out. Severus responded by gently cupping both her breasts, lifting them, and rubbing his thumbs across them while they deepened their snogging. Lily was already moaning.

It wasn't long before he felt her tugging on his belt to unfasten it. She finally stopped snogging to look down because she was not getting far. "Let's try that thing from the other day. If I have you in my mouth, I won't be screaming."

"You'll still make noise."

"Sound softening charm," she said with a wink, and stopped playing with his trousers to grab her wand.

"That might not be enough."

"Stop worrying so."

He lowered his mouth to her tit, and tried to suck as much of it into his mouth as he could.

Lily squealed, "Wait till I cast it, Sev."

Once she did cast it, he mauled the other breast to get Lily panting and mewling before pushing her back towards her bed.

"No, no, Sev. I don't want to mess it up in case we have to open the door quick. You can get on top, while I lay on the floor. I got thick carpeting, and it's like new since I'm hardly home."

"If it's too uncomfortable that way, Lily, let me know."

Lily finished taking the rest of her clothes off. Severus was doubting she was thinking logically. She did not want to mess her bed, but did not consider getting completely redressed would take time. Severus removed everything from the waist down. He didn't want to try to crouch over Lily with his trousers half down around his knees or ankles.

Doubting that this was going to be comfortable, he suggested, "Maybe side by side?" Even though Lily was already on the floor waiting with her legs spread wide.

"No, come on, Sev. I'll let you know. I'll pinch your leg or something."

He knelt over her chest facing away from her feeling awkward, and jerked up when she ran her hands under the back tail of his shirt. "Is that where you're ticklish?" Lily asked.

"Hardly," he replied, getting his bum raised in the air. He looked backwards and then moved to line himself up with Lily's mouth. She did not wait till he was perfectly positioned, but grabbed him and tried to swallow him whole. Severus huffed at the incredible way her mouth felt before he finished positioning himself directly above her.

Looking at her, he realized that either he had to lower himself to rest on his elbows to use both his hands, or he'd have to improvise with one hand. Lily began writhing when he first reached down. She was already in the mood with the smell of her arousal tantalizing him before he separated her labia with his hand to tease her with his tongue. If Lily weren't so easy to please in this area, he would be lost because whatever she was up to was mind-blowing, especially the vibrations from her moaning around him.

Lily panicked initially when Sev backed up a little more, and more of him surged into her mouth as he got directly above her. She could breathe. She could breathe even better if she moved his bollocks a bit, and actually felt safer with her hands up, in case she needed to signal for him to get off her quick. Until then, this gave her the perfect opportunity to caress his balls, and to figure out what else he's like her to do. She was proud when she did not lose control and hurt him the first time, even though she did unashamedly squeeze his head with her thighs so he could not escape. He gave her a couple minutes respite with only stroking her with his hand while he rocked his hips gently. Lily moaned encouragement, and tried to set the tempo by pulling on him.

Severus found Lily to be bossy even when he was sliding himself into her mouth. As long as he wasn't going too deep, why would she care how fast he was going? Though that was not important. Not the least bit important at all. She was allowing him to go deeper than when she was on her knees, and wanting more. That's what he should be thinking of and listening to those slurping sounds she was making. Lily was also creeping around with her fingers. He had not realized that his bollocks could feel that nice, unless it was the fantastic feeling in his cock just spilling over to his nearby body parts. It was so bloody absolutely fantastic that he decided to let Lily keep heading further back with her hand, rather than interrupting to warn her.

She was delighted when Severus made a little hiccuping sound as she stroked behind his bollocks, and kept up the pace she had set without her pulling on his hip. Now Lily could cup them so they were off her nose, and out of the way so she could continue petting him with her other hand. Less than a minute later, Lily felt his dangly bits tighten up and he barely got out a stifled warning before he started to pull away. She clamped both her hands on his hips to keep him still as her mouth was flooded with repeated spurts. Lily had tasted it before, but still could not describe it or even say what she liked about the taste. It tasted like nothing else.

Severus was trying to catch his breath. It had never gone that fast before. Usually he thought of how Lily was responding while shagging, but this time he was not thinking at all. Just listening and feeling, and then Lily did not want her mouth to let go of him. Even now, she was still sucking on him.

"Did you want to do that again?" he asked, unsure of what she was doing.

Lily pushed his hip, so he pulled completely out. "I want you to lay down on your stomach so I can look at something."

When he moved and realized she was looking at his bum, he objected, "Not that."

"Shh, move your legs apart. You can pick the next thing after I check this out. Your imagination is so wicked but so wonderful, Sev."

He cooperated, but was ready to jump up or roll over or get away in some fashion, if Lily did anything objectionable. She was rubbing that spot again and asked, "Right here is nice?"

"Yes."

"Hmm," she said as she thought. She put her other hand on herself, and did not feel anything particularly pleasant, especially since she was so slippery there now. Lily liked it when Severus put his fingers in her bum. It made her think she was such a deviant. Severus' naughty and wicked deviant, and Lily wanted him to become just as uninhibited as her. Though not in public. She understood his naked thing, but whatever he had going on with his feet was just plain weird. She had not stopped petting this new spot, and brought her other hand back and asked, "Can I try here?"

"Why?" he asked.

"I wonder if it'll feel as sexy to you as it does to me."

"I don't think so."

"Thinking. Bah!" Lily was gentle, and just stroked him in both places.

"Are your fingers wet with something?"

She purred, "Yes, and I'm going to put more on you."

Severus hissed in disgust as Lily did that. Lily was getting him randy again, but he was not sure he wanted this sort of thing happening. Feeling pleasant was one thing, however, this was different. He did not mind touching Lily's body like this because it was Lily, but why was she touching his arse? Why did she touch him at all? Finally, he said, "I'm not sure I like this."

"Alright. Maybe you don't like it today, Sev, but I'm going to give this another try."

When Severus started to get up, Lily mentioned, "Your brave soldier liked it well enough."

"Brave soldier?" he asked. He didn't want her calling his cock nicknames, and why was it like a brave soldier?

"So what do you have in mind?"

"I could put your tongue on the roof of your mouth and then shag you deep and hard."

"Ooh, sounds promising."

It sounded so promising to Severus he cast _langlock_, since Lily did seem agreeable. He liked the sound of his skin slapping hers so turned her around and wasted no time pulling her hips back and shoved himself into her. Lily grunted, but it was a good grunt. The kind that drove Severus wild. Once she got her hands on something to hold herself steady, Severus continued and in short order Lily burbled her incoherent delight, and they matched grunts and finished together. Why didn't Lily realize how perfect they were together?

Severus sighed and removed the jinx from her.

"There's got to be some way where we both can go hammer and tongs at each other. I like being on top, and I also like it when you are in absolute control too. So now you have your assignment for next time, Sev. Find that position."

Severus blearily agreed and fondled Lily's breasts for a couple minutes before he kissed them. Lily sighed in contentment. This was going to be a long week.

*************************************

AN: I saw the movie. Bicycling children in Spinner's End? I can concede on electricity, but a yellow kitchen might take some time to digest.

AN: Jealous Slytherins have no idea how much money Sirius receives, but that does not stop them from talking about it.

AN: The singing engagement ring is from The Tenth Kingdom. There's a clip currently on You Tube of Wolf in the jewelry store making the purchase - .com/watch?v=86p58NDkgxw&feature=fvw


	39. Chapter 39 Caught in the Act

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 39 Caught in the Act

Once Vernon was gone, Lily had no plausible reason to close her bedroom door. Severus would not stay in their guest room, no matter how direct her mother was. Lily was happy to hear he was sleeping well, and he was looking better so she supposed sacrifices had to be made. Her mum had gotten Severus to agree to eat breakfast and dinner every day at their house for the rest of the holiday, and her mum reasoned it was only fair since he had a practiced apparition/floo route for the two of them to catch the Hogwarts Express, and would save train fare for her family.

Lily was suspicious that Severus was going to London frequently. She pestered him on what he was up to since he was now receiving mail as well. Severus shared some of it with her, and Lily was nosy about the others. Was he still going to sell his books, and these were interested buyers? Severus would probably be very logical about it, and look to somehow get the best price, rather than marching up to the first place that bought used books and take whatever they offered him. What he did tell her was the younger Crouch had an Arithmancy question, Regulus Black seemed to be bored, Lovegood from that barmy magazine was continuing their regular correspondence, and an invitation from Frank Longbottom to his wedding.

"It says I may bring a guest. Did you want to go, Lily?"

"When?"

"Early July, so that would be a month after Petunia's."

"What happens at a wizarding wedding?"

"I've never been to one, but I suppose it's similar. Dress nice and bring a gift."

"Ooh, I never got around to buying dress robes. Mum?"

"I suppose," her mother answered. "Try to find some that are suitable for more than a wedding though."

"Alright. Hey, why did he invite you and not me? I am in Gryffindor too."

"You told me to keep writing him, so I did."

"When?"

"Last summer. You told me to stay friendly, or he'd haul me in when he finished his auror training."

"Huh?"

"I remember that," Lily's mother agreed.

"If I did, than I was kidding," Lily replied. Really, Sev had no sense for when she was joking around. When she told him to be friendly for real, he wasn't. How did Severus even sound friendly enough in a few letters to get Frank Longbottom to invite him to his wedding? Frank was a prefect and then Head Boy when the Maraurders were at the height of their popularity so by association he also knew Severus. Was it the whole thing with Lupin and Black that got him to revise his opinion? He had been at Helen's funeral with his family, but it was Frank that wrote Severus first over the summer. Unable to figure it out herself, Lily asked, "What did you write to Frank?"

"Hardly anything. His letters were long, so I found enough in them to which to respond. He's a bit caught up with himself and the whole doing good thing. Longbottom suggested I should test to be an auror. Can you imagine?"

"I think you have all the right classes for that, Sev."

"The Ministry? Even if Longbottom and Oakby are honest and trying to do a good job, they won't last long there. There's too much corruption, and if they try to do something about it they'll end up dead."

"No, they won't. Really, Sev, and you have to do something."

"I know. I guess if that's all that's left to me. Maybe with some more potion work getting published, someone outside of Great Britain will offer me an apprenticeship."

Lily rolled her eyes, then stopped in midroll which caused them to ache. Severus had told her all this before, but at the time she thought he was being silly over Slughorn. That's before she found out what a toerag the Head of Slytherin was. She had only been invited to one dinner party so far this year, and that was soon after getting out of hospital with dragonpox. He no longer said wonderful things about her in Potions, and had initially assigned her a seat way in the back of the room this year.

Severus suggested, "We could go to that place in Hogsmeade on our next weekend to look at robes, and if nothing there interests you, there's the two places in Diagon Alley. We can stop there when we return home for the summer holiday since we'll need a floo anyway to get close enough to here to apparate safely."

"I guess. What about a gift?"

"If one from the two of us would be sufficient, you can help me find something."

Lily frowned. She knew from Petunia's registry that couples getting married expected lovely and expensive things. Even the toaster and blender on Petunia's list were expensive ones.

"So what do you have planned over at Spinner's End today?" she asked, annoyed that her parents would not let her help Sev. She was seventeen, and obviously that house had not killed her best friend.

"Perhaps I'll paint the kitchen ceiling. Mrs. Evans' suggestion to put fresh paint on the parlor ceiling worked, so maybe it'll work in the kitchen too."

"You used the brightest white you could find, Severus?" Mrs. Evans asked. She had thought about getting over there, however Spinner's End, even with a witch and a wizard was still a daunting place.

"Well, I got it out of my wand so it was white at least."

"How do you get paint out of your wand?" Lily inquired. Yet another spell he knew that she did not.

"A charm. I know all kinds from Mr. Filch. Maybe next year he'll let me work on some of the irreplaceable items like the tapestries or paintings. For now, I can do grout, caulk, paint, and a grey foam that gets hard to seal up cracks and holes in the castle stone. I can make minor repairs to cracked and chipped stone, tiles, mirrors, and wood. There's also cleaning spells in addition to _scourgify._"

"I think I have a can here, Severus. Can you show me how white the paint is, please?" Mrs. Evans asked.

Severus went over and gave Mrs. Evans some paint. She tilted the can and mentioned, "It's a bit thick."

"That's my final version. The first batch was thinner, and didn't cover as nicely. Once I got some on the ceiling, I knew I wanted something that completely covered all the marks and stains."

"Do you have water leaking through?"

"Not on the first floor. Upstairs, water comes through the roof. I guess I should repair that. I don't know that sort of thing yet so maybe over the summer. Mr. Filch will probably know exactly what to do, and perhaps he'll let me try it on the school. There's enough windows overlooking portions of the roof that I should be able to find something needing repair out there."

Mrs. Evans nodded in reply. Perhaps her husband would hire Severus to do some odd jobs inside their house this summer for some pocket money.

Lily hated to admit it, but Mr. Filch's job and knowledge must be extensive for him to keep a building as large as Hogwarts in good repair, even with house elves. He was so undistinguished and unimportant looking. Was Severus going to emulate him? Other than Filch, only that Arithmancy guy seemed to like him, and he was a bit of a pill himself. Lily knew Severus was fantastic at Potions, but he was right that finding an apprenticeship without Slughorn's recommendation meant he was pretty much on his own.

*********************************

The week felt like a loss to Lily. She saw Severus a couple times a day, but he returned to Spinner's End without her. It's not that she enjoyed Spinner's End more than her house, but she knew Severus was working over there. If her parents had caved to her whinging about him being lonely over there, she'd help him, but also distract him.

Tea with the other bridesmaids was alright. Lily had nothing in common with Petunia's friends. Two of them were already married, and the rest were engaged so the discussion revolved around houses, husbands and when the babies would start. Yuk! Lily was tempted to blurt out something ridiculous, but her mother was here too.

The day they were going to King's Cross, Severus went upstairs with Lily.

"I picked up something for you yesterday," he said, as he enlarged the paper wrapped, rectangular item.

"A present?" Lily inquired.

"No, they wrap all the books up. I didn't ask them to put paper on it."

Lily quirked an eyebrow at Severus. How is something for her not a present? He was at a bookstore yesterday. Did he buy this, or trade some of his for it? It would not be polite to ask how a present or non-present was paid for. "Oh, well, um …" Lily did not know what to say, so put her hands out to receive it. What kind of book was it?

"It's a muggle title, but the illustrations were magicked so they're moving," he murmured.

Lily carefully unwrapped it, but did not recognize the title. It sounded foreign. The bloke on the front cover had a turban on his head and the lady had on some scarf things. She opened it dreading it was some mythic love story that Severus expected her to know, and was going to spout off about how the two of them were destined to be together like the paki Romeo and Juliet on the cover.

Her mouth dropped open as she got a bit deeper in the book while paging through it. She studied the illustration and then turned the pages slowly to find the next one while looking at the text.

"Is it the type of book you meant, Lily?"

"Um … where do they sell books like this?"

"This one is borderline due to its historic significance so I would not have to go to some dodgy place in Knockturn Alley for this."

"Have you been to any of those dodgy places?"

"Not yet. What is it you need that you'd send me there?"

"I need some time to think about that. This is … uh, educational … though I'm not sure if this one's possible."

"Even if it was, having you stand on your hands all twisted like that is impractical. I think the proportion's off in this drawing anyway. My legs are longer than your arms."

"Hmm, oh, we've done this one. Dog?"

"That's how four-legged animals do it, not just dogs."

"So this is a known book?"

"Yes, the Kama Sutra is old, so don't go flashing the cover around where someone can see the title."

"I didn't recognize it."

"I doubt you will forget the title now."

"So why'd you get this for me?"

"Didn't you charge me to imagine new ways to make love? Now, you have a book with illustrations to get your own imagination working. The book itself has more than that, but it's known for the sex acts."

"Thanks." Lily sighed, "Mary's going to be on the train with us so I can't look it over in front of her to choose what I want to try tonight."

"Tonight?"

"Yeah, after the feast."

"Alright. I still think something keeps following us around, but I got some new spells."

Lily tutted. Severus and his paranoia. "I hope you don't take all night casting them. I'm positively throbbing with need."

"Maybe we can leave early?"

She brightened at the sound of that and ran out the door, saying, "Let me check with mum."

"The book," he called after her.

"Oh no," Lily exclaimed, running back into her room. She opened her school trunk and dug down to hide it.

Severus shook his head while watching her. If Lily did not want her parents knowing about them, she should not wave books like that under her mother's nose. He could have not reminded her, but it would be his fault for her being a total dunderhead. It would have been a showdown between her obstinacy to never be in the wrong, and this 'throbbing need' of hers. How did she throb? Who was the man here? Or did she overhear some bloke, and it sounded perfect to her ears to describe her insatiable sexual appetite?

It would not be such a problem if they has someplace of their own that he could nastily ward against intruders. Perhaps Severus should have exerted more pressure on Lily. His feelings regarding privacy meant little to her, which confused him since she did not want anyone knowing how close they were. Although his concern was different since he did not like being unclothed and vulnerable. The sight of Lily would probably gobsmack any viewers. Not even the raunchiest of Mulciber's photos had a witch showing such unbridled enthusiasm.

Lily finished throwing more things into her trunk. Turning to him, she urged, "Well, come on. There's no time to waste, Sev."

She stampeded down the stairs, making a great deal of noise. Severus followed at a slower pace. He did not race around the Evans' like some Spinner's End hooligan, even if he had been welcomed here for years. He caught up with Lily, who was speaking at a fast clip, concluding her reasoning, "... floo to Diagon Alley so if we go early, I can get in a little shopping, or just looking, since I'll be needing those dress robes, at the very least. Maybe some owl treats too."

Shopping? Was there ever an end to shopping? Even though Severus could be on some Honeydukes-fueled Zonko's buyout while swilling a barrel of butterbeer while astride his Nitwit racing broom, or whatever it is typical male students his age did, it seemed so pointless. His disdain remained, even now that he could afford to imitate James Potter's gluttonous consumption.

Mr. Evans looked at Severus. His slumped posture of defeat signaled that he expected at least a couple hours of carrying whatever Lily handed him. Even with magic, his daughter treated him like her manservant without consideration that he had no money of his own to purchase anything he found of interest, if he was even allowed to look. Clothes shopping with women was the worst. Taking out his wallet, he muttered, "How much is this going to cost? And be sure to buy Severus lunch for putting up with all this … robe stuff. I'm feeling weak just listening to it." Turning to his wife, he sweetly asked, "Dear, do you already have ice cream or is it too early in the year to ask for a knickerbocker glory this afternoon?"

"Dad!" Lily interrupted. "A knickerbocker glory? It's only a week after Easter."

"I think I'm out of brandied cherries, but I'm sure I have some other fruit," Mrs. Evans said, getting up to check on what she had available. If not, she could run to the store after lunch.

Lily rolled her eyes. Her parents were too much sometimes. Knickerbocker glories and her mother eagerly dashing into the kitchen. She did step forward to take the money her father was offering.

Her mother was calling out, "Bananas or grapes? I do not have any melba sauce, but could use raspberry jam. We only have vanilla ice cream, I can whip up some meringue for a layer or would you prefer all whipped cream?"

"No strawberry?" Mr. Evans replied loudly with a pout.

"I can get both fresh strawberries and strawberry ice cream if you'd like a scoop of that between the two scoops of vanilla. Did you also want strawberry sauce?"

"That would be too strawberry."

Severus and Lily were looking at each other. Severus was trying to picture whatever this was that consisted of at least three scoops of ice cream. It was small wonder that Mr. Evans was so hefty. He did not fail to notice Lily's contemptuous look. Add gravy, and she'd be shoveling it in too.

Once the knickerbocker glory dilemma was logistically handled, they were given permission to leave as soon as they liked. Lily ran upstairs to get her trunk. She already had everything in it.

On their walk over to Spinner's End to fetch his trunk, Severus suggested, "We could stay at my house for a couple hours."

"I haven't had a chance to look through that book yet."

"I believe we'll think of something."

"I have to be on top first, Sev. Alright?"

"That's fine."

"Do you even care, Sev?"

"About what?"

"How we uh … you know."

"Somewhat, but I know you relish impaling yourself repeatedly."

"Is there anything you like about that?"

"Besides you enjoying yourself? Um, I guess the way your breasts move. They're at eye level, and seem to be a moment behind the rest of your body."

"So you like my breasts best?"

"No, it's your eyes. Than there's the way your waist flares into your hip. The curve is …" he tried to illustrate by waving his hand, " ... like a sculpture."

Lily stifled a comparison with abstract art since she wasn't sure if Severus would understand what she meant. When he said sculpture did he mean some marble statue of Venus perhaps? "Is that why you like that dog thing?"

"At first, it was because I got deeper, but now you are not holding back so I'd have to say I enjoy the noises you make. It's more primal than saying my name. I don't know. I think what I like most is when we're slow and gentle, face to face. I suspect that would be very soothing before going to sleep. Not too energetic to get our hearts racing, but comforting and together."

"Not get my heart racing? Whenever you touch me, it's thudding in my chest, Sev."

"You know what I mean … all sweaty. That's alright for another time."

"I haven't noticed you sweating."

"I feel like I am with some of the things you think up, and when you're very energetic, your whole body glistens with it. You don't stink of it though."

Lily's mouth jerked into a sneer. If that was Sev's idea of compliment, she was not feeling it. "Maybe we'll think of a workout for you, after I get mine."

He groaned in response. She better not be considering that he could do that handstand thing.

Lily squinted when they got within sight of Sev's house. His house was slightly different than the others. Were his front steps white before? And the grout between the bricks wasn't exactly white, but cleaner then the house next door. Did he do magic outside? He could get in trouble, but Lily considered that it kept him from sulking and mourning inside the house.

He let them in, and she stopped in the doorway. All the books were gone, except for a handful on a stool. It was also bright. Not truly clean in a spic and span way like her house, but not the room it was before.

"Where did those come from?" Lily asked, pointing at the venetian blinds.

"I was looking at the other houses. A lot of them have those things. I had to go inside next door to see them from the other side. Even closed, they let in some light in the morning so it's not completely dark."

"Next door?"

"Yeah, she thinks there's something wrong with me so it didn't take much. The Snapes are pretty much the only family that never complained about all the noise her children make, since mother fixed that within a couple days of her moving in."

"What's she like?"

"She's a whore."

"Severus!"

"What? She makes a living by having sex for money."

"How do you know something like that?"

"I've never seen the money counted, but they talk, he hands her something, and then she either leans against a wall or gets on her knees in the street, and they conduct business."

"How can you watch something like that?" Lily asked, but feeling a little turned on by the thought.

"I'm not watching that part. Some of those men don't look right. What if they hurt her? I don't know how many children she has, but she's all they got."

She frowned. When Severus put it that way, especially after that one fellow verbally accosted her and then performed a lewd act on this very street, of course, someone should be keeping an eye on things. "Why doesn't she get a regular job?"

He shrugged, "I think she likes sex."

"She's told you that?"

"Not so much, but she's quite forward with suggesting that she could assist me with things, and keeps showing me her body."

"What?"

"It's nothing. She never tries to grab me, and I don't think she knows I've watched her work."

"Doesn't she know you don't have any money?"

"Yes, she said it would be free. As I first said, she believes I go to some special school because there's something wrong with me."

"Did you?"

"What?"

"Shag her?"

"No, why would I?"

"To shag."

"Can't you believe I'm a bit more selective about it?" Severus asked. "I don't go sticking my cock in every hole I see."

"Why not? It's fun."

"You'd shag every bloke with a boner?"

"No, it's different for girls, Sev," protested Lily in disgust.

"That would lead to a disproportionate number of partners, unless us blokes all turned upon each other."

"What?"

"Never mind."

"Good, my breasts want to get to bouncing," Lily announced as she started stripping.

"Not here," Severus whined. He clarified, "Upstairs."

"Why?"

"Why not? I don't think of this room as … sexy."

"Oh, like your bedroom is?"

"My parents never shagged in there, so yes, it's better."

"Ugh," she replied, pushing past Severus to hurry upstairs. On her way up, she asked, "Can we move your bed away from the wall?"

"I suppose."

"I have an idea."

Severus did not respond. He'd find out soon enough.

Lily objected when he cast the standard contraception spell, "I already cast the month long one on myself, Sev."

"Better safe than sorry," he grumbled at her.

Once he was undressed and moved the bed to where Lily wanted it, she wanted him to lay down on his back and let his legs hang off either side. It was physically possible, but he commented, "This is uncomfortable enough before you are on top of me. It's not going to work."

Lily responded to his objection by straddling him, while saying, "It'll feel good soon enough."

The only part of him that was feeling good soon had to combat the ache in his lower back, centered on his spine.

When Lily stopped after whooping it up a few times, he hopefully asked, "Are you done?"

"You didn't, did you? I didn't feel it."

"Huh? Are you done so I can get some feeling back in my legs?"

"Are you in pain?"

"Yes, I told you that before you started."

"Why didn't you tell me again?"

"Because you don't listen to me."

Lily let out an exasperated sigh as she climbed off Severus. She helped him raise his legs onto the bed, and watched him close his eyes. "Are you really hurt, Sev?"

"No, it's not a lasting thing. Just an ache that was getting worse. Haven't you ever wanted to enjoy the relief when something painful is over?"

"So you are feeling better already?"

"Soon."

Severus confused her terribly. Lily could understand not wanting to feel pain, but basking in the feeling that it was over? That was something she never experienced for herself.

"So uh … you didn't … um, finish?" she asked while observing that Sev currently was not in the mood.

"Eh, as long as we don't try that again."

"Hmm, it wasn't as good for me as I thought. I thought less motion on your part would make it better."

Severus opened his eyes and quirked an eyebrow at Lily. If she wanted him not to move, maybe she should do it without him?

Annoyed that Severus did not care for her idea, she replied, "So it's your turn. Do you want me on my hands and knees?"

"We did that this week already. Let's try to see if we can fix it with you on top. Maybe if I sat up, and held you?"

"We've done that before."

"It was no good?"

"It was brilliant."

"Since we don't have all day, why don't we settle for what you found brilliant?"

Lily sighed and muttered, "I don't know. Maybe you can tell me more about uh... women that do it for money." She took hold of him, gently rubbing his foreskin back and forth to get him randy again.

"Like what?"

"Anything that you think I should know, Sev."

"It's not glamorous. Actually, it's rather disgusting because they take one customer after another."

Lily's face scrunched up at that, and she asked, "Don't they bathe?"

"On the street?"

"Oh."

It was Severus' turn to make a face as he haltingly suggested, "Did you want to do something like that … pretend I mean, like we did in the classroom?"

"What should I wear?"

"Maybe we can skip that this time. I'm not sure of all the pieces. Short skirt, but the tights are different than what you wear for school. They're held up by something and there's nothing in the middle. No knickers, and a ridiculously low cut top or dress. Can you put on really red lipstick that rubs off?"

"Rubs off?"

"You want to be somewhat of a mess, rather than … I don't know if there is a classy whore, but that way it'll smear around your face and get on my cock too."

"I guess," Lily said, and cast a charm she normally did not cast upon herself.

Severus' lip curled. "That is the shade. Did you just want to briefly put your lips on me, or did you want to stop getting me hard with your hand?"

"Wouldn't you be eager and raring to go when you approach uh … a woman such as this?"

"I wouldn't be. Do you want me to talk to you like your um, disposable?"

Lily giggled, "Disposable? I guess. You hardly talk when we're … you know."

"How do you know? You're so loud, no one could hear me."

"No, you don't. Give it a try, and if I get offended, rather than getting all hot, I'll tell you to cut it out."

"And don't forget to lie, Lily. You want a tip."

"Alright."

"I guess we'll end up standing against the wall, so let me move the bed further, and I'll proposition you."

"Should I pose in some way to let you know I'm in the business?"

"Let's pretend you are in a bad neighborhood standing around so it's likely that's what you do, unless you sell drugs."

"Drugs?"

"Never mind. So ready?"

"Yup."

"Hey, you have many customers tonight?"

Thinking about what Severus said about the repeat business, Lily decided to answer, "No, just got here about twenty minutes ago. Looking for a little fun?"

"You been doing this long?"

"No, I um, fell on hard times, you see my mother ..."

"I don't want your life story. I want to know if you're worth anything."

"Tell you what, I like you. I like you a lot. How about I cut you a deal? Five sickles?"

Severus burst out laughing. "I didn't realize you wanted to be that cheap. Sorry. Five sickles? What do I get for five sickles, a handshake?"

"Well, I can use my mouth if you want."

"We could start with that, but I want sex, not you slobbering all over me."

"That too," Lily said, getting turned on by Sev's aggressive tone. "You want to step into my office?"

"It looks like a trash-strewn alley to me. Yeah," he replied, and gave her a slight push towards the wall.

Lily leaned against it and smiled.

"Unless you have a ladder for me to climb on, I suggest you get on your knees."

She giggled, and Severus took the opportunity to ask, "Did you want the pillow for under them?"

"No, I'm good. I'm not going to be down here long?"

"I don't think so. If I get too rough, let me know."

"Rough?"

"Yes, the customers are impolite," he replied.

"I guess I'll have to try to do a good job than," Lily commented before beginning the blow job.

"That's it?" Severus replied, putting both hands on Lily's head and pulling her closer to him. He muttered, "Is there alright?"

"Mmm," Lily nodded.

Severus looked at how much of him was still out and began rocking into her mouth, holding Lily in place.

Lily felt this was better than last week because her nose was free, rather than being upside down with Sev's bollocks hanging down on it. This was kind of odd, like he was shagging her face. It was working rather quick. The lipstick had rubbed off onto him. She had to put it on every time she used her mouth. It was so dirty. He drew himself out and requested, "Come on, get up, you lazy whore. I'm doing all the work here."

When Lily smiled at him, he smirked back, then got back to being an impatient customer. "What the hell's this?" he demanded, holding up a glop of goo from Lily's snatch right in her face. "You said I was your first tonight."

"You are. I'm so turned on by your prick that I got all hot and bothered."

He lifted one of her legs, wrapped it around his waist, before calling her, "Lying slag," and sunk himself balls-deep in one stroke. "Probably already serviced a dozen customers tonight, you filthy whore."

Severus stopped moving because Lily was already shuddering and twitching in ecstasy from that first stroke. Initially he thought he had hurt her, but then he felt her muscles contracting around him, trying to take him over the precipice with her. She gurgled out something nonsensical as she finished, then started trying to hump him, even though she was only standing on one leg.

"You're good at faking it, but you should try waiting till I've actually done something. Bloody well should pay me for lessons," he complained, as he changed his thrust slightly to get her gasping again. Since Lily suggested he should talk, he kept expressing his annoyance. "Trying to hurry me along so you can get to your next one? So how many you get to on a good night if you're trying to get me off in less than five minutes? Twenty, thirty, forty men pounding you a night against this wall?"

Lily did not know what Sev was doing, but his acting was driving her crazy. He had to talk more during sex.

Since Lily seemed to be having one long, nonstop orgasm, Severus kept changing what he was doing to break up his rhythm so he didn't finish before she was exhausted. That seemed to be the only thing that kept Lily from wanting to continue shagging. He cast a charm wandlessly on the wall to keep track of the time. Merlin, they had a couple hours before they needed to leave.

About forty minutes of pounding, gyrating, and alternating stoke paces later, Lily's leg gave out so Severus lifted her up against the wall, and he finished as he rested his head on her shoulder, listening to her emit gibberish in time with his thrusts. He almost dropped her when she stiffened with him, pushing her legs straight out and arching her back, removing the wall's support from her. Severus ended up falling on his bum, with Lily on top of him.

"Wow," she gasped. "That was wild."

"Uh huh," was all he could reply. Maybe he didn't have to worry about enemies, when Lily was doing her darnedest to drive him to his physical limits. His corpse might be a dessicated husk once she was through with him. She'd probably use it a bit before moving onto her next conquest because he wouldn't be moving.

Getting up, using him for leverage, Lily complimented him, "You're good at playing these, Sev."

He was relieved that she was digging through her clothing. There was no second time left in him, even if he was motionless.

"I've changed my mind though."

"Huh?"

"Here's your five sickles."

"What?"

"Maybe I hired you."

"Alright," he said, taking the money. He had nothing left in him to even object.

Taking his wand, he slid the bed back and from where he sat, filled the basin with water so they could wash.

Lily griped, "You put our toothbrushes away, Sev."

"I didn't know you'd be over. I like to keep them safe. They're special."

"They are only toothbrushes, Sev. It's you who's special."

Severus did not know how to respond. Lily was probably still on her sexual high, and would treat him like rubbish later. If he was so special to her, than she should do something about it. He could understand Petunia needed the spotlight at the Evans now, but there was no anything about them together in the future. Lily talked about her. Her alone, except for little things like their summer seaside trip, that Severus did not really want to go on.

*********************************

James stormed into his bedroom and slammed the door shut. His parents were total jerks. They held up his apparition test for close to two weeks, until it was almost his tryout date for the Falmouth Falcons. He tried out for them yesterday, and already received his rejection letter this morning. They didn't understand he was out of practice. His parents did not allow him to fly while he was under house arrest, and thanks to Snape last year, he was chucked off the Gryffindor team.

His parents were against him playing professional quidditch, or at least till he studied and sat for his NEWTs. What did he need those for? Once he got in some practice, he'd be on a team in no time. He still had to hear back from the Pride of Portree. Their deep purple robes looked better than Falmouth's anyways.

What James really needed was someone to be a bit supportive of him. Like poor Peter. He was always there for him. Damned shame.

Everyone his age was either at Hogwarts, off figuratively stabbing him in the back all over Europe, or sitting in Azkaban. Remus. Remus was his friend. Maybe while he waited to hear back from the Prides, James could get someone working on Remus' appeal. It was the school's fault, along with Sirius'. Sirius already got himself kicked out of England for good, or whatever, but Hogwarts knew Remus was a werewolf and left him on his own when he transformed where any nincompoop could stumble upon him.

Six months in Azkaban was surely more than enough to consider Remus had learned his lesson not to trust … hm, well, Sirius Black. James was sure as heck ready to move out of this prison himself, so the two of them could find someplace nice, and James would look after his friend when it was that time of month. No one could take away his animagus form. Drat, he meant to register it, after McGonagall figured out that Peter was an animagus. Maybe the next time he was at the Ministry. That'll show his parents he was good at something besides quidditch.

*********************************

Severus fell asleep so fast on the train that Regulus Black stopped, looked in, and kept walking. MacDonald and Evans again? No. He couldn't fake being asleep as well as Snape. Besides, he would still be able to hear them chatting away like a couple of gibbons.

Lily was miffed. If Severus was sleeping so well at Spinner's End, why did he pass out in the corner of the compartment? Perhaps he put himself to sleep to avoid any embarrassment with Mary? That was really juvenile, if he did.

Mary talked a bit, read a bit, and watched Severus a lot. His pockmarks were not clearing up as fast as Lily's, although he did start with substantially more. Overall, he looked horrible. Poor Severus. It looked like she might have to wait till seventh year to reopen her wooing of him. Perhaps write him little innocent notes over the summer so he'd remember she was his friend too. There had to be times that he tired of Lily. Mary sure had enough of those moments. She sighed while missing Helen. Her best friend ever. Severus could be a good friend, even if he did snore. There was a charm for that so that wouldn't be a problem. Why didn't he do something about his teeth?

*********************************

Cygnus had been wrong. Lord Voldemort did not like his servants to give him bad information.

Addressing the aristocrat, gasping on the floor after a brief touch of _crucio_, he demanded, "How could you have made such a mistake? The goblins wrote back to Crabbe. He is not the heir."

"My lord, the problem is not my records. It's the goblins. When there's no will or immediate family, they take it upon themselves to find the lowliest possible scum to inherit as an insult to wizards. They despise us. Manipulating our wealth is the only outlet for their frustrations."

"What is the name of this lowly scum?"

"I do not know, my lord."

"I suggest you better find out. We can use that gold, unless you'd rather contribute more to our cause, dear Cygnus?"

"I would if I could, my lord. Nothing is more worthy, but I do not control the Black vault."

"Than I suggest you find out who my new favorite is."

"New favorite?"

"Whoever inherited the Lestrange fortune. Pay attention. _Crucio._"

Crabbe shuffled his feet nervously, hoping he would not be next. He had already suffered not inheriting that vault. Mrs. Crabbe was not happy.

Voldemort watched the spittle fly out of Cygnus Black's mouth as he screamed and gasped. The cup was in that vault. Undoubtedly it was safer now since Bellatrix was the only one who knew who gave it to her to put in the vault. Now it was one more piece of junk. He had seen that vault years ago, when the elder Lestrange was his schoolmate. He smirked at the remembrance of the boy's boastful attitude, and how he hoped to impress him with his piles of wealth. What was wealth compared to raw power? Power to decided who lives or dies? Power to prevent his own death, and to cause the death of others.

He flicked his wand, ending the curse. Voldemort still needed Cygnus for now.

*********************************

The most notable thing about the feast was Slughorn was back again. The Slytherins had tired of mocking Regulus. The fun was over, and now it was kind of sad. Really sad in a pathetic way. Perhaps Mrs. Black had one of those nervous breakdowns after her eldest son was an out-in-the-open murderer, rather than the usual Slytherin way of doing things, and her husband was murdered in Knockturn Alley, while probably visiting the brothel or worse. The Black family had fallen so far, that it was now within Slughorn's social reach.

No more Lestranges either. Slowly but surely all the old families were being snuffed out, while other families made their fortunes off their demise. No one knew who the Lestrange vault had gone to yet. The goblins were discreet, but the Ministry was full of leaks. Any day now someone would claim their properties and file changes for the deeds to be transferred. When that happened, they'd all pull out their lineages and try to figure out if it was someone worth befriending, protecting, or murdering.

Lily was oblivious to what was being whispered over on the other side of the Hall, and somewhat at the other three tables, but with less focus on murder and becoming false friends.

Regulus had sat with Barty and Severus, along with some of the other boys that Severus would give homework help with an intentionally lesser degree of sarcasm. Their speculation quickly died, and they moved on to their summer plans. The only one that seemed remotely interesting to Severus was Barty and his mother were going to stay at their summer, seaside cottage because his father was too busy to notice whether they were home or not.

Mulciber butted into their conversation when he came down to take one of their untouched platters of food back to the older boys, and suggested that Snape could now spend his summer wanking all day because his parents were gone. Severus did not bother to respond since Mulciber's only skill was wanking. The group agreed once he was gone with the food that was probably an ideal day for Mulciber, and that's why he achieved a whole two OWLs. Better he wanked than impregnating something. Hopefully, the Muclibers would soon join the Lestranges as another extinct wizarding surname. The lads then kidded Regulus that he better start right after graduation at restoring the house of Black. Joining in the fun, Reg kidded that he had precious cargo in his loins and would have to give up flying, and entreated Barty to do the same, since it was unlikely there would be another Crouch if his parents were living in two separate residences.

Severus retained the same demeanor throughout their discussion. The possibility of land and properties intrigued him, but others knowing who gained them did not. Also, while at school he did not need a house, and Spinner's End was a roof over his head when he wasn't. Since he did not know if he could obtain any apprenticeship yet, it would be premature to burden himself with whatever there was.

What hurt though was the talk about future families and children. Severus did not consider himself to be some great bastion of the proud Snape name with a duty to have strong sons to carry on some nonexistent family whatever, but there were women who would marry Black and Crouch knowing that their primary duty was to bear them children. Would Lily marry a man like that, after all her talk about her future contributions to healing and wizarding kind, and put his family's needs and the task of having an heir and probably a spare first, and then raise them before her daydreamed goals even resurfaced in her mind? By then, her contribution might be having her house elves bake up some treats for her to deliver to invalids at St. Mungo's, and throwing a stack of galleons at some cause that caught her interest.

After dinner, Severus attempted to tell Lily he was still tired to request that they do something less physical, perhaps lengthy snogging, but she claimed he needed more exercise while walking them around the castle before she chose where they would hide out till curfew.

It was during their long stroll around the sixth floor that Phi signaled him discretely that their observer had returned, or at least Severus hoped it was the one that had been following them for months because he was ready to try some new spells that he had found for trapping invisible perusers who were not ectoplasmic, but not harm them.

When Severus slowed down and started muttering at his stupid bird, Lily said, "Come on, Sev. Can't she find the clock tower from here to let herself out?"

He hissed, "No, Phi's keeping an eye out for us. It's close."

Lily's eyes widened as Severus cast something at her, but she felt nothing. She looked down and saw her clothes appeared fine, and didn't pay attention to what Sev was doing until the entire hall behind them thickly filled with crystallized webbing, and he continued casting spells in quick succession. Only the difference in the wand movements let her know it was multiple spells, since Sev had a bad habit of doing most spells nonverbally so she couldn't learn any of them. Stupid git.

She strained to make out what was forming in the middle of it all as various substances stuck to the form. Peeves was shorter, and would not normally be standing with his feet on the floor. This was tall with a pointy hat, taller than a student's cap.

"Headmaster?" Severus asked, while still keeping his wand on the object.

"Quite. It's taking me a bit to work through that one binding you cast at me, Severus."

"_Finite incantatem_."

"My thanks, dear boy. You certainly got the drop on me there."

"Have you followed us before, sir?"

"I wouldn't say followed, maybe tagged along."

Lily's lip curled up. What a dirty old man, following around couples in the school. Yes, they might be up to out of bounds things, but he was watching? Albus Dumbledore was ruining her life. Bad enough he was responsible for these scars on her shoulders that got her in trouble with her family. Got Helen killed. Got Mary's hand bit off and turned her into a werewolf every month. And now he was sneaking around to watch her shag Sev? Severus was jumpy enough as it was, but now this loggerheaded toerag goes and proves him right that they are followed? She'd never get into his trousers again. "I must protest this, headmaster. This goes beyond decency. C'mon, Sev."

Severus was confounded. Dumbledore was following them? An immature or troublemaking student, Peeves, some Gryffindor trying to relive the Marauder's glory days, but the headmaster? Why? If he wanted to give detentions or suspensions or expel them, he didn't need to catch them doing anything. He could just do it. Dumbledore did the complete opposite for the Marauders for years. It wasn't until they killed someone that he couldn't pat them on their heads and hand them candy for being a pack of rambunctious boys. Expelling students without cause would be just as easy for him. It's not like Severus had family that would complain.

Lily repeated, "C'mon," and pulled on Severus' arm.

"I cast spells in the corridors, Lily," Severus reminded her. Since he already had unending detention, was he about to be sent home on a suspension, or was this the excuse they needed to expel him?

"Who cares? You didn't even muss his robe."

"I concur about that restraint," Albus added. "Quite gentle since you did not know who your adversary was."

Severus waited for him to get to his point. The old coot could keep following them since it was his school. Anyone else answered to someone. Well, he guessed the teachers could spy on students. Probably the reason why some of these characters were at a school in the first place.

Lily crossed her arms over her chest. If he thought he was going to punish Severus, Dumbledore had another thing coming. He asked for it prowling around like that. That freaking toerag Potter had an invisibility cloak. All those years of acting like he was so clever, and then his secret was found out. She heard they were expensive. Like his stupid Nimbus broom. Proved someone didn't need brains to be rich. Sirius Black was the same way. Rich, spoiled and didn't give a damn about anyone. She supposed Dumbledore was the same way, despite his reputation of being one of the good guys. Good guys weren't dishonest sneaks. They could all claim they were bold, courageous and clever till they got caught. In a way she was happy that Severus trapped him. She'd rather know he was telling the truth than thinking he was going crazy from lack of sleep and his unresolved guilt over his mother.

"You did cast spells in the corridor," Albus started, sensing both of them were hostile, rather than pleased with how cleverly they caught him. It was true, Severus had enemies. Protecting himself, with such finesse to determine who or what it was first, before casting something harmful, did not deserve a punishment. "However, I recognize that you led me to an unpopulated area to protect your fellow students, and your cautious approach to an unknown follower was highly appropriate, rather than the 'hex first, ask questions later' that others take, my boy. Obviously I cannot encourage students to attack me so how about I award twenty points to Slytherin for your good judgment? And five for Gryffindor too, Miss Evans."

Severus' eyes narrowed. What was the old man up to now? Was he going to drag this out till a day before he took his NEWTs and then expel him? If Lily had not been with him, perhaps he would have killed the bastard. He had appeared helpless, but appearances could be deceptive.

Lily sneered. Did the headmaster actually think he could cover up getting caught being a dirty peeping tom by awarding points? She'd tell … Prof. McGonagall. They could start with her, and if she didn't care, then maybe the Board of Governors of this crap pile. Lily could ask Mary. She'd know who else, probably some Ministry people. They were seventeen, so if they wanted to have a private consensual moment together, they shouldn't have some creep watching them or anyone else that caught his fancy. Egh, did Dumbledore fancy the way she looked? Nasty pervert. Why couldn't he have followed them on the night the six of them went out to look at the Whomping Willow? Three times as much fun then.

Albus was befuddled by both of them. Severus had already proven not to be moved by the school's system of rewards and punishments, but usually Miss Evans took pride in her accomplishments. Perhaps because he awarded Slytherin more? Mr. Snape appeared to have done all the work.

"Let's go," Lily said, grabbing Severus' arm. They could go to Prof. McGonagall right now. Obviously, neither of them were in the mood for any lovemaking after that. She wrinkled her nose in disgust just thinking about being watched. Tagging along, her arse. He was intentionally stalking them.

He allowed Lily to lead, but did not know where she was marching briskly towards. "Where are we going?"

"Prof. McGonagall's office."

"Why?"

"To tell her."

"What for? Dumbledore can do whatever he wants."

"No, he can't."

"Are you trying to get expelled, Lily?"

"He can't expel me."

"He can't?"

"What for? He's the one in the wrong."

"Only from your point of view. If called upon to defend himself, I'm sure he could tell a much different tale of what he was doing."

"What?"

"It's called lying."

"We should tell Prof. McGonagall. She may not approve of what we do, but the headmaster sneaking around to watch us is not right either. We're probably not the only two either."

"If you must. However, if it looks like she already knows, or doesn't care, you shouldn't press it with her. I don't believe he ever saw you undressed, if that's any consolation."

"That's probably why he was so persistent. Maybe him and Slughorn got some kind of contest going on."

Severus was revolted. Slughorn and Mrs. Black was some distant, implausible combination, but Slughorn luring students into his quarters for dinner parties and dangling his promises of a leg up to do something else with them? Is that why he liked the good-looking ones with the eager to please attitude? Did Dirk Cresswell suck him off, bend over, or both?

He grabbed her arm as she started pounding on the office door. "Don't be demanding. Prof. McGonagall does not take orders from students."

"I know," she snapped back, but toned down what she was rehearsing in her mind.

"Miss Evans," Prof. McGonagall greeted as she opened her door to find a prefect outside. "I don't suppose you caught Mr. Snape out of bounds?"

"No, he caught Prof. Dumbledore. That's why we're here."

"The headmaster?"

"Do you know he sneaks around the school invisible following students?"

"He is the headmaster."

"Following couples then? Male and female students to watch them?" Lily suggestively added.

"Miss Evans, I do not like what you are implying."

"He's been following us around since Valentine's Day. We didn't know who it was."

"Come in," Minerva invited them with a frown. Albus did say he was keeping an eye on Mr. Snape since his parents' deaths. Obviously something got miscommunicated.

"The first time we noticed someone was the Saturday after Valentine's Day. We stayed at the castle while the rest of the students went to Hogsmeade. When Sev's familiar noticed someone else in the room, it got befuddled somehow and could no longer fly."

Since Prof. McGonagall looked at him, he added, "My bird had trouble with Peeves, but whatever it was did not register as having an ectoplasmic base, which would be poltergeists, ghosts, haunts and the like, even when they are not visible."

It was clear to Minerva how Miss Evans could misconstrue the headmaster's intent. Following them on the Hogsmeade Valentine weekend when they obviously stayed behind together? Albus might pretend to be clueless about such things, but he really had to face facts.

"Since then, Sev's bird noticed that we were still followed, but was quiet about it so we didn't tip off our pursuer."

"You did not do anything about it?"

"It seemed premature to cast a couple bubble headed charms and let loose garrotting gas to deal with it, Professor," Severus sarcastically commented. "I cast various detection charms, but I suppose the headmaster has a number of repellents on his person, giving me poor results."

"Tonight, Severus pounced and trapped him. He was unapologetic, and will probably keep spying on students when they think they are alone," Lily insisted.

"The headmaster would surely have warned you of his presence if the two of you were doing anything inappropriate."

"I don't think so. Why would he choose the two of us to follow otherwise?"

"That would be for him to explain," Minerva replied. "As a prefect, I must remind you that you are a role model to younger students."

"This is part of protecting them, if some dirty old man is spying on them in the baths or whatever the headmaster gets up to."

"Stop! I will speak to the headmaster. He was not following you around to watch you engage in illicit activities."

Lily would be interested to know what kind of crazy tale he told McGonagall. He purposely followed her into a room with just the two of them alone as a silent observer. That was not simply crossing their path while invisible.

*********************************

Albus Dumbledore did not have any wild tales to tell Minerva McGonagall. She was rather smug when he concurred that he had been rendered helpless by a sixth year. If Albus did not know any better, he would have thought she swallowed a canary on her way to his office.

By the time she left, he agreed to disagree that he had gone about keeping an eye on Mr. Snape the wrong way. Miss Evans and Mr. Snape had not been doing anything embarrassing, however Minerva was adamant that continuing to follow the same students while invisible was a gross breach of their privacy.

Although Miss Evans had not admitted what they could have been observed doing, Minerva was almost definite they did more than talk, eat and play a friendly game of chess. Albus was such a nitwit.

Concerned that the students had the wrong impression of what he was up to, Albus found Severus where Argus said he'd be in one of the upper corridors cleaning. Phi gave her person the signal that one of his enemies was approaching, and he responded by looking at the mirror she angled for him, while pretending to be playing with it. The riot of color identified the headmaster easily. Visible, but still a nuisance. Severus continued with his work for a couple minutes, refusing to acknowledge the galling old man until he chose to address him.

Albus had noticed Severus' attire before. He continued to admire the boy's striking disregard for fashion. Bold in its statement about the unimportance of materialism. Quite audacious for a Slytherin, especially with Horace's fanatical belief regarding clothing making the man. Horace was definitely kicking himself over missing this gem. Unpolished, unrefined, yet unbreakable. Unbreakable was the original Greek word for diamond, or something like that. Prof. Upsilon had been on his mind too much lately since he frequently usurped Horace's seat during his absences. He expressed the opinion that Severus was a natural philosopher.

"Ah, Severus, my boy."

Was Severus supposed to believe that the irresponsible fool accidentally stumbled across him seconds ago while strolling about the castle? He may have a winking and elbowing relationship with the Minister to overlook his unreliability, but Dumbledore would never have that with him. In constant remembrance that this man could do whatever he wanted to Severus, he muttered a reply, "Headmaster."

"Mr. Filch is going to run out of things for you to do at the rate you're going."

"I doubt it, sir," replied Severus, resistant to the headmaster's jovial tone.

"Well, I wanted you to know that I was not intentionally following you to cause concern."

As the silence grew between them, Severus answered, "Alright." He knew the crackpot would rather not have been detected at all. Why bother stating the obvious?

"Also, I wanted to repeat that your choice of spells was impeccable. I recognized a number of them. Detain, detect and expose without injury. I'm sure you thought of many possibilities, perhaps even a first year with an invisibility cloak who would be unable to defend himself."

Severus did not respond to such a transparent taunt. He and the rest of the school heard Potter was caught with an invisibility cloak by Flitwick. So he had it since he was a first year? Figures that the headmaster would benignly allow an eleven year old to sneak about out of bounds. Man was a complete boob. After all that occurred with those four Gryffindors, he still remembered them fondly, rather than contemplating he may have made a mistake with his overly forgiving attitude towards his favorite students.

"Is everything else good with you, Severus? I noticed you left the school for Easter break."

"I am licensed to apparate now."

"Of course. Did you go home or somewhere nice to enjoy the fine weather? After such a icy winter, who would have thought the April would be so pleasant?"

Home or somewhere nice? Did Sirius Black send him some insults to try out? He grunted, "Home."

"You live in a very lively neighborhood with a distinct air of intrigue."

Severus was not sure what Prof. Sprout had told the other staff about his home. He suspected she had talked because Prof. McGonagall's interest in him started shortly after that. The only explanation he could come up with to match the headmaster's description was that someone must have stepped on a discarded syringe, in the vulnerable velvet booties with tassels that the bastard currently wore, and gotten caught up in the grip of the dregs of whatever drug remained in it.

"Close to Miss Evans?"

"Yes."

"Her family is very nice."

"Yes." Severus thought it unlikely that the son of a bitch was contrasting them to his parents, considering they were dead. However, insulting his dead parents would come naturally to a Gryffindor. The taunts regarding his mother from the ones that still idolized the Marauders were weak, since they had no real information to formulate something that had some bite. He reminded himself there was nothing he could do to Dumbledore now. He needed to wait. The miscreant was only guaranteeing that when revenge came, it would be painful and drawn-out.

Unlike a sudden burst of accidental magic, unbeknown to both of them, sending a sudden pain in Albus' left knee and he fell to the floor. The pain was not abating once his weight was off of it.

Cautious of some sort of trick, Severus inquired, "Sir?"

Phi took wing to scout for someone or something else nearby that was in hiding. If something stealthily attacked the enemy of her person, that did not necessarily make it his ally.

"My knee."

Severus had already determined that was the probable cause for the screaming from the way the headmaster was holding it. "Would you like assistance to the Infirmary, sir?"

"If you could help me up and lend me your shoulder, I'm sure we could manage."

Trap. Physically assist? End up with a knife inserted between his ribs to pierce his lung, or perhaps from behind to be twisted in his kidney? Is that perhaps what happened to Pettigrew? Snuck around one time too many, found out a secret of the headmaster's, and then the blackmail attempt went wrong?

He set his chalk to writing a message to Mr. Filch on the ceiling. After the stone lintel and Mr. Filch's agreement that the school was crawling with nasty students after hours, they figured that there should be some way to let the caretaker know if Severus needed to willingly leave where he was working.

_Levicorpus_ did cross Severus' mind. The left ankle, using the indication of _laevus,_ would be particularly sweet, considering the headmaster was holding his left knee. He could be faking. The man lied about so much. Potter faked quidditch injuries to get the girls cooing over him, and then would shrug it off to duel with him. Dumbledore did not even pretend well by doing something. He had simply been standing there. Dunderhead.

"I don't want you touching me," Severus said as he jerked his wand and nonverbally lifted the headmaster bodily, rather than using only his left ankle.

If Albus' knee wasn't so painful, the tone of his student's voice when he said such a thing would have wounded him.

Phi could not circle well in the corridor, but liked when they reached the stairwell. Now she could cover more. She let her person know that she only saw one other person in the vicinity. He was entering the stairs from a corridor lower down, so he was unlikely to be the attacker.

Severus called, "Shingleton." Dumbledore could kill them both, but he might like the head boy.

The Head Boy looked up and responded, "Snape. What are you up to?" He did not immediately assume the worst since the Slytherin had aided his younger sister. He had a terrible reputation, but that was mostly because of the idiot Gryffindors who considered reading books during meals to be a crime.

"Ah, Mr. Shingleton. Mr. Snape is helping me to the Infirmary."

Gaspard Shingleton took that as a positive sign. The headmaster was conscious and believed Snape was assisting him, rather than about to drop him over the edge into the center of the stairwell. He started up the stairs, since anyone else they met may get the wrong idea when they first spotted this. "Were you injured, Headmaster?"

"Rather silly, my knee gave out. Quite painful," Albus replied. "They may be expanding a line on the London Underground. I have a scar just above my knee that is a precise map of it."

Severus rolled his eyes. The jackass forgot he was in dire pain and was launching into some tangent like he was having tea with Slughorn. If this stint of getting the headmaster up to the Infirmary worked out, perhaps Slughorn would want to be conveyed around the school in this manner. He was too important and fat to have to walk. Slughorn and Sirius Black's mother must be like two whales beaching themselves. At least if Lily continued to eat her way through everything that got within reach, she might plump up enough to drive away other fellows. He didn't recall anything that he read about those cursed scars causing a desire for food and sex, just rare meat, but something about Lily had changed about the time she was attacked. Severus did not blame her. It was something he needed to live with. His life was about enduring, rather than enjoying. Right now, he was enduring the senseless discussion between the head boy and the headmaster while being their silent lackey, rather than enjoying a demonstration of why Hogwarts' staircases should have railings installed.

Singleton got the Infirmary door so Severus was able to drop the headmaster on the first bed without entering the room. He muttered, "I'll be getting back to detention now," and let the door swing shut in his face, while the head boy took care of whatever needed to be done.

Madam Pomfrey came out of her office. "What happened to you, Albus?"

"Something with my knee."

She tsk'd and took out her wand. After a couple waves, she commented, "You popped it out of place. Racing up and down the stairs? You are getting close to a hundred."

"No, I was standing around, talking to Mr. Snape."

Poppy raised her eyebrows and asked, "He have something to do with this?"

Gaspard did not like the tone in her question. He doubted Snape attacked the headmaster, unless he came strolling along the hall singing about how much he loved Potter and Black.

"No, he didn't. He helped me get up here."

She sighed, and maneuvered his kneecap back.

"Oooh! Besides, Severus had me trapped earlier tonight. If he wanted to harm me, he could have then."

"What do you mean trapped?"

"Ah, well, Minerva told me already I was being bad. I was following him and Miss Evans while disillusioned, and he stopped me dead in my tracks and exposed me."

"Did you suspect him of something?"

"No, I'm concerned about him."

"Isn't it a little late for that?"

"Right. I forgot you were in on that too, Poppy."

Gaspard had no idea what they were talking about, other than concern over Snape. Both his parents died a couple months ago. The prefects discussed it, when Evans wasn't around. Death Eaters is what he heard. The story was kept out of the paper because it was so devastating, but the Lestrange brothers died during the fight. Little young for He Must Not Be Named to be targeting his family because he was a blood traitor. So what if he was friends with Evans because that's the only student that lived near him? He lived in a muggle neighborhood, or that's what he heard. What other friends was he going to have? Potter and Black for years accused anyone who talked to him of doing Dark Arts and attacked them. He also roomed with four of the wealthiest students at the school. Severus Snape was no Peter Pettigrew kissing arse, laughing at every lame joke, and applauding every bowel movement his rich friends made. Turns out it was Sirius Black that was the murdering coward, and he probably had Pettigrew killed for knowing too much. Black was out there right now, working for He Must Not Be Named. No accident that Snape's parents were targeted, nor that Black's family were the ones killed at the scene of the crime, along with his favorite cousin, Bellatrix, dying from mortal injuries she got from the same muggles that killed her husband. Must have been a bloodbath for muggles to fight back against wizards. Fight or die.

"In on it? I am concerned about a student who you forgot about."

"I'm sorry for that. Truly I am. However, how many times must I say I didn't know it was important?"

"Hobnobbing at the Ministry is more important than Hogwarts? You and Horace better get your priorites straight."

"I'm here now, and I have been attempting to talk to Severus."

"Perhaps you fail to realize he's not interested in talking to you now."

"He's not much of a talker. It takes time for him to get comfortable with someone."

"His mother's dead due to you, Albus. That's not something that's easy to forgive."

"That's a rather strong thing to say, Poppy."

"I have no evidence to the contrary, do I?"

Albus lifted his eyes to the ceiling and asked, "My knee all better now?"

"I'll give you something for pain and swelling to take before bed. It can pop out again so rest it. No creeping about the school trying to catch couples snogging."

"I was not. Has Minerva already told you that?"

"Why would she? You said yourself you were following Mr. Snape and Miss Evans. What do you think they do?"

"They talk and play chess."

The next time Poppy gave a class for the students on where little wizards and witches came from, Albus had better attend. Play chess. What a numbskull.

Gaspard had something new to think about. He knew Dumbledore was distracted by He Must Not Be Named, and Slughorn had also been taking time off from teaching, which was a major problem since Gaspard needed his Potions NEWT. They did something to Snape. Something to do with his mother. No wonder why Sprout took Snape out of two classes for the morning, rather than his own head of house. He wondered what Frank would say once he told him about this.

******************************************

Regulus was unhappy. Uncle Cygnus was doing nothing, or was not letting his nephew in on his plan. His mother let Slughorn hold a dinner party at her house before they returned to school for some people he wanted to impress.

For no reason, he got seated next to the boring potioneer who shared his name, Regulus Moonshine. The man was a loser. He was a potion brewer, who had done nothing except get himself saddled with an apprentice based on Slughorn's recommendation, and the apprentice was about to start her sixth year of apprenticeship in July because he would not certify her as a master until she actually mastered the craft.

He had to make Slughorn pay. Snape seemed his best weapon, but how to use him? The sixth year was hard to motivate, unless it involved that mudblood, Evans, and perhaps her werewolf friend, MacDonald, now that Evans was packing on a few too many pounds. The only advantage Regulus noticed was her tits were getting bigger too.

Money? Snape already annoyed Slughorn at school simply by existing. What could he do over the summer, if Regulus' mother would not allow him to invite the half-blood over? Getting himself invited to Snape's was not going to help, it would just get him out of the house so his mother and that gigolo could carry on even more outrageously.

That's what he appreciated about Severus Snape, now that his horrible brother, Sirius, was gone and no longer got distracted from bullying his little brother by the ugly half-blood. When the rest of Slytherin made fun of him, and then his mother, he did not bother joining in. Barty hadn't either. It was hard to tell if Barty even listened since he was starting his one year countdown to his OWLs.

Snape was late getting back from detention tonight. He had been quiet earlier today, and Regulus was not sure if it was his usual silence. His cousin and her family had killed his muggle father, and that had been what the younger students wanted to talk about, or rather who was going to inherit their wealth. Regulus had no idea why Bellatrix and the other Lestranges would have been there, even two months later. Uncle Cygnus pretended they had gone rogue, and took it upon themselves to attack muggles randomly, but what were the chances with all the muggles in England to end up at a pub in the middle of nowhere? As likely as dear Sirius, James Potter and Peter Pettigrew innocently stopping in there for a drink last summer.

For all he knew, Snape could think it bloody hilarious that his mother was under whatever spell Slughorn put her under. He had loads of reasons – Sirius, Bellatrix, Sirius, getting Slughorn out of the school to get a Potions master next year who might notice that he got into the NEWT level class, and oh yeah, darling Sirius. Although Regulus had his own reasons for associating with Snape, he never did anything harmful to him, other than some nudges and taunts to prod him in the right direction. Regulus had even given him the robe off his back last June when the Marauders had gone too far. His brother really was a bastard. Between that and taking a turn once a week to guard the bath while Snape was in there, Regulus had gotten more than enough of a look to know what kind of shits his brother and Potter were. He had a few brushes with _incendio_ from his dear brother, except his parents cared to get him healed. Hogwarts didn't. Regulus knew from personal experience when Sirius made the back of his underpants go up and over his head till they caught on his chin when he first got on the train that first day. Hours of agony, unable to sit and McGonagall telling him he'd have to wait till after he was Sorted. Then Pomfrey shrugging at him and a few other boys that crossed his brother's path on the train, getting off the train, and anywhere near the Great Hall that night. Admittedly, Slughorn did give him something for his balls and bleeding arse crack. Barty had tied Sirius' shoelaces to Pettigrew's the next morning at breakfast. Pettigrew had gotten up first, fell on his face, and then the Marauders had blamed Snape. His brother and his friends were so stupid. Snape, Snape, Snape.

Here he was. Dressed as fashionably as Filch. Merlin, was he hideous. Thank goodness chunky mudbloods and werewolves were slutty enough to throw themselves at him and his meaty muggle dick. Perhaps that had been his muggle father's charm to snare a witch? If he didn't have those two tramps, he'd have a lot of time on his hands to think about making lists of enemies, and probably making all of Slytherin house miserable, now that the Marauders weren't around.

"Alright, Snape?" Regulus called.

"Suppose. You, Black?"

"Are you going to be up for a while? I wanted to talk to you."

"What about?"

"Earlier today," Regulus said, getting up and approaching Snape who had made no move to join him. "I know firsthand how insensitive our classmates can be. If they talked longer about it, I would have insisted they stop."

"It's fine."

"No, it's not. You help them, and me, so we can respect any boundaries you set, if we still want your help. Next year, I know you'll have NEWTs, but reviewing it with me when I'm a fifth year taking OWLs will be a huge help."

"You got Crouch."

"I cannot relate to what Barty says when he's in study mode. He's a good student, but he's no good to me as a study partner."

Severus shrugged.

"I didn't know anything about my cousin either. If you ever thought that."

"I doubted that would be something for her to boast about in advance, especially to her much younger cousin still at school."

Regulus nodded, but mentioned, "Though I admit it's damned strange. Every aspect of it. My uncle, her father, has said he didn't know what they were up to. She's grown and out of his house. Those Lestranges could have come up with the idea."

"If you have no information, why bother mentioning it?"

"Only to reiterate that I am not of the same beliefs." Following the bastard of a squib sired by a muggle? Absolute folly. He had no idea why his uncle had not disassociated himself yet. Better, set an indisputable pureblood up to take things over, while the Ministry is busy with the madman. "You know I'm not like that, Snape."

Severus did not know one way or the other, what Regulus believed. They were loose allies against his brother, and now that his brother was no longer here, they still associated with each other. "Was that it?"

"Uh … maybe not, what are you doing this summer?"

"Going home. I did not complete what needs to be done in the past week."

Regulus nodded in what he hoped would be interpreted as sympathetic understanding. "I met a fellow last night. A potions master, who already has an apprentice, but he may be interested in hiring someone for the summer. Seems he's overwhelmed, even with the apprentice."

"Who?" Severus asked. If it was someone of note in Britain, it was not going to happen.

"Let me write to him, see if he's interested. I don't want you to develop hard feelings since he's likely to be your colleague one day."

"I don't know."

"What does it hurt? The guy's not pleased with Slughorn. I'm not pleased with Slughorn. And I doubt there's any love lost between you and Slughorn. You understand?"

"Try not to make it so obvious to him. He might think you are gold-plating your description of my abilities in order to make a fool of him later for taking me on."

"Don't worry. He's probably looking for anyone not recommended by Slughorn now. He's had the same apprentice, recommended by this school's potions master, for years."

A slight snort escaped Severus, "Maybe he'll take it as an overall indication that Hogwarts does not teach potions properly, and that apprentice is the best that the school has to offer."

"What does it hurt? You were in The Practical Potioneer for theoretical work you completed at the age of sixteen, and the Order of Merlin might get his attention. You aren't talentless. Just that you aren't Slughorn's type because you think for yourself. Nor Dumbledore's because you aren't a brainless Gryffindor."

Severus shrugged, "If you feel like it, Black. Getting me work for the summer won't exactly knock Slughorn on his arse."

"I'll settle for anything that irritates him now. He's oblivious to direct attacks."

"Can't you spit on his food at the next dinner party?"

"Oh Merlin! Sitting next to him is the worst seat at the table. I have to time it to get a burly quidditch player between me and him so he forgets to direct questions my way. Now that he's pretending to woo my mum, I doubt he'll forget me. Probably ask me stupid questions to try to get me to brag about our house or wealth to impress his little crowd."

He remained silent. Severus could not relate to something like that. However, it would not be prudent to point that out to him. Black seemed sincere, and it was undoubtedly heart-wrenching to watch your mother seduced during your father's funeral. Since Mrs. Black did not need Slughorn, he suspected some potion like many others. Slughorn never displayed the sort of charm needed to sweep a woman off her feet in front of Severus. He considered Slughorn a selfish man, much like the headmaster. They'd rather indulge their own whims entirely than bother wasting any love on someone other than themselves.

"At least Barty gets invited with me so I don't have to listen to all the berks trying to outdo each other to get Slughorn's attention. Anyway, I'll write the bloke as you looking for general work, rather than as a potions genius. That way he can decide what you're capable of handling, or deciding you're too demanding before he meets you."

"I have some things to sort out, Black, if you'll excuse me."

"Sure. Good night."

"Night."

******************************************

Lily had been right. Albus Dumbledore was a total toerag! She wasn't sure how Severus bathed or went to the bathroom, but he definitely was not letting Lily get her hands in, or even on, his trousers. Maybe he'd feel safer in Hogsmeade, or outside somewhere. The weather was getting nice enough that being undressed in the evening wouldn't be too chilly without warming charms.

They both had a great deal of homework. Lily had to work extra hard on Divination since she totally hosed up February on Sev's chart. She had pressured him to think about anything, but all he came up with was that he was informed about the success of the potions experiment regarding those eyeballs. Her professor did not feel that outweighed the death of both his parents. Lily argued that if he had known them, that he might feel differently. After the words were out of her mouth, Lily felt two inches tall. He gave her a chance to recover by asking about wealth. That was clearly in Sev's chart, and largely the reason Lily claimed good fortune for that month, overlooking the dire portent in his house regarding family. Inheriting a house and its contents, when he already lived in it, did not impress the instructor.

At least she had Mary in Muggles Studies for a laugh. Even Severus started correcting her perceptions. His knowledge was not as extensive as Lily's, but he recognized some things as being totally incorrect. He also had a better grasp of 'street life' than Lily. Though Lily thought he exaggerated about how many muggles took drugs they bought from dodgy people, and told Mary so. Lily did not know any muggles like that. She was also positive that he made up that it was pills, injected liquids, powder they snorted up their noses, other things they smelled, things they smoked, and liquids that were put on other objects that they licked off. When did Sev have time to think up all this crap? With detention and Sev also having Runes and Arithmancy, Lily was not sure he had time to sleep.

Lily was also concerned by the amount of mail Severus was still receiving. He was not sharing most of it with her, but one morning he asked her if she wanted to work over the summer. Some potion bloke wanted to hire Severus, but for seven days a week for six weeks. Forty-two days straight. Severus wanted to write back to suggest he could hire the two of them – Severus and Lily – for five days a week for those same six weeks, and they would split the same salary between them equally.

She took the letter and read it over, "Who's Regulus Moonshine?"

"Someone Black knows. He already has an apprentice so we may not be doing anything requiring any skill. This could help towards obtaining your healer apprenticeship after graduation."

"Hmm, but what would we be doing?"

"Anything. We might be pulling weeds out of his garden. He asked for both my Potions and Herbology OWL scores."

"I don't want to pull weeds. That's dirty and I'll burn."

"For six weeks, you might want to consider performing any reasonable task in order to gain his favor."

"Look who's talking."

"What? I do whatever Mr. Filch puts me to."

"I didn't mean that."

"Are you interested or not? I don't want to be away from you for six weeks, so if you aren't, I'm not either."

"What's the big deal, Sev? It's only six weeks."

"I also think seven days a week is unreasonable, even if he's including a place to sleep."

"Is he going to feed you?"

"That's not mentioned. Since I would be living there, I presume it would."

"Is that a decent wage? Only one hundred galleons?"

"Someone's offering you more, Lily?"

"No, but I don't want either of us to work for less than we're worth."

"You are sitting on so much money that fifty galleons is not worth your time? Apprentices do not get paid straight wages. It's an arrangement between the master and apprentice. Some are only fed and clothed for their apprenticeship."

"If a hundred's a lot, you should take the job and not worry about me, Sev."

"Why not? I think it worth discussing."

"You don't tell me what's in the other letters you get."

"I'm not making any decisions that would involve you."

"How does this involve me?"

"You mentioned that we might be doing things this summer, now that we can apparate. Why would I decide to tie up six weeks of the holiday without talking to you first?"

"Alright. Can you put in some of your tricky conditions?"

"Like what?"

"Like which five days and the hours? I don't want to have to work sixteen hours a day for this fellow to think he's getting his money's worth."

"Should I suggest Saturday and Sunday as our days off, since that's when your father is not at work?"

"Yeah, that would be good. Can we apparate home from Mould-on-the-Wold? What kind of name is that anyway?"

"It's closer than London, but I can ask about floo connections. There's one public one in the local pub. I've already checked my directory."

"Where'd you get that?"

"The Ministry. Write like you are a tourist visiting, and they'll deluge you with pamphlets on what to do and how to get there."

"Hey, you did not share those with me. I might want to look those over so we can take our little trips."

"Alright. There's also a sort of bus, but I'm not sure if we can use it all the time. It's for 'stranded' wizards and witches."

"I guess they don't define stranded?"

"No."

"So hours … um, what's reasonable? He might expect we're young and full of energy."

"How about I specify no more than twelve hours per day, or fifty hours per week? That way if there's something special happening, we are flexible. Maybe include frequency of breaks too?"

"So if together we are working a hundred hours per week, that would exceed what you'd work alone in seven days? That way it sounds like a good deal?"

"Until he sees you eat," Severus laughed.

"That's not funny, Sev," Lily protested. She had been gaining weight. Might be because she was getting older and her womanly curves were just filling out. That's where her clothes were getting tight.

"Oh, come on. It was more of a comparison to me, than in general. If he does not have separate rooms for both of us, should I even suggest we can share? Or don't?"

Lily bit her lower lip. This fellow could take her as some loose woman. Besides, if she got into a fight with Sev, would it be fair to throw him out?

"I can try to phrase it professionally," Severus added. "It won't be until we're actually there that we'll get a feel for how private it is. The potioneer listing in the library says he has a family, so there could be children running all over hollering."

"After that sneak Dumbledore, I doubt that would be a big problem," Lily muttered darkly.

"Should I reply offering both of us then?"

"Sure, I'll let my parents know."

"What was your OWL in Herbology? You got an O for Potions, right?"

"You did not memorize my grades? Really, Sev. I got an E for Herbology, and an O for Potions."

"Too much has happened since last summer for me to remember everything. Did you know Crouch plans to sit all twelve OWLs next year? No wonder why he's giggling like a goon half the time."

"Aren't some of those classes held at the same time?"

"I thought so. You're in Divination while I'm in Arithmancy."

"Well, those two are complete opposites, so I can see why no one would take both. That's probably what's pushed him over the edge."

Severus sighed. Lily was always picking on Arithmancy.

"Jobs. Wow. So what are we going to spend the money on?"

"We don't need to spend it right away."

"Why must you be so practical, Sev?"

"You aren't going to want to wear the same dress robe the rest of your life."

"Oh yeah, so we're going to look around Gladrags at Hogsmeade this weekend?"

"We can."

"Do you have any money, Sev?"

"Yes."

Lily frowned at him. Where did he get money? The apparition class supposedly wiped him out. He was selling those books, rather than letting her father give him a loan. Why did he have to be so difficult? It was not going to inspire her to marry him when he would not take money when he needed it. Willing to work was good though. Just that he was being a bit odd with not wanting all the money for himself. Maybe it would help her get an apprenticeship, but if she was asked to pull weeds by hand, that was going to be Sev's job. She pressed, "Enough for dress robes?"

"I'm not sure, but if I don't, I'll find out then. Besides, aren't yours going to cost more? Witches are fashionable. Most wizards aren't, or at least I have some difficulty picturing myself in something with goldfish swimming along the hems."

"When did Dumbledore wear that?"

"Not yet, but he may wear something like that any day now."

"He's such a toerag."

"Is there anywhere else you want to visit in Hogsmeade?"

"Maybe. I don't know. I'm so frustrated about us not being able to ... you know with him following us."

"Perhaps it will make us stronger. We spend time together doing other things for now."

Lily frowned, "Yeah. Lot of tests coming up, even if this is the year between OWLs and NEWTs, it's no time to slack off. And you know what, if this Moonshine is a peeping perv like Dumbledore, I might just hex his eyeballs out."

"Since we're surprising him with this idea to hire both of us, I doubt he planned on watching."

"Why not? You are very interesting, Sev."

"Maybe to you."

"I want to keep you all to myself."

"What about you?"

"What do you mean?"

"If you want me to be only yours, Lily, are you conversely only mine?"

Lily tutted, "Why do you have to bring that sort of thing up, Sev?"

"I thought that's what you were talking about."

"I don't mean it as seriously as you do."

"Do you mean it at all?"

"Sev! Of course I mean it, in a fun way. Not the forever way."

Slowly he responded, "I'm not understanding what you are trying to say, Lily. If I am fun, a good companion and you love me, why can't it be forever?"

"Because I need to meet more people. There could be someone that's a better fit for me."

"What is wrong with me?"

"Nothing's wrong with you that uh, you know … I mean I do tell you, but sometimes then I understand it better later so I'm not always right."

"Is there something that is currently an obstacle?"

"We're only seventeen, Sev. I'm interested in being a healer, and you are uh, interested in Potions?"

"They aren't so different, Lily. Both of us will need apprenticeships. Even if I did nothing except follow you around, you'd still need an apprenticeship with someone."

"Well, we'd have to wait till after that, wouldn't we?"

"Why? That gives us less of a reason to be together, is that what you want? So you'll have time to meet these other people?"

"I don't know. I mean, as an apprentice, I might not meet many people. It might not be till later."

"In other words, maybe twenty years from now, or you'll always be looking to meet new people?"

"No, I don't even think it'll be twenty years. I just want to be sure first."

"Is there something I could improve for you? Other than blinding the headmaster?"

"Um, well, why are you getting so many letters?"

"My letters? You already know I correspond with Lovegood. Longbottom's last letter is going to take time to answer because it was odd for him. Usually it's a lot about him, but this time he wrote asking direct questions about me."

"You don't have to answer them."

"I'm not going to answer all of them. Most of them are speculative anyway. I think he's fishing around to give himself something extra on top of auror training. He called it a case study, or something like that. I've also picked out a solicitor so I'm corresponding with him."

"Why do you need a solicitor?"

"Since I have some property, I thought it was responsible to have my documents in order."

"That's alright."

"That's about it. There were probably more owls than I needed because I was looking for a wizarding solicitor that could also handle muggle matters."

"Oh, so that explains it."

"Did you want to read my letters?"

"No, I don't need to do that, Sev."

"So what besides me receiving letters is bothering you?"

"I don't know, Sev. You do so much that I don't know about."

"What are you suggesting? Should I write down everything I do, or you want to live with me?"

"Live with you? How can I do that? You're in Slytherin."

"I mean outside school."

"I don't want to live in Spinner's End."

"If this employment does not pan out, maybe I can find us something for the summer."

"All summer?" Lily whinged.

"Lily, what do you want to do? You are not clear."

"I don't know."

"Do you at least understand my problem then, Lily? You don't know what you want, and I can't adjust to it."

"I know. You've told me this before, Sev."

"I think we should spend more time together this summer, including some time overnight. Is that unreasonable?" Severus figured if Lily was having sex all the time, she'd stop thinking about why she did not want to be with him.

"No, that seems fair. The only thing that worries me is what you said about somewhere other than Spinner's End, if we don't get this job."

"You mentioned the seaside. I'm going to give you the papers from the Ministry for other places. We may not be sharing, if this Moonshine does not accept both of us, so we may not be able to count on that."

"That's fine. I understood that. Hotels cost money."

"I think it's my turn to say 'I know'."

"I don't think my parents are going to give me money to shack up with you somewhere."

"I wouldn't expect them to, since it'll be just the two of us."

Struck by a sudden idea, Lily said, "They may be going on vacation this year, after Petunia's wedding. They are just waiting to see what the final bills are. Maybe you can come with us. Mum will be easy to convince."

"Not the seaside with them. She'll pry too much into why I won't go swimming."

"There's something I don't like. You and your conditions."

"What? You've had me undressed enough times to know why I should not wear barely anything in public. My conditions are to avoid problems I can foresee."

"It doesn't matter to me what you look like."

"It does to me."

Lily sighed.

******************************************

Bored to tears, James sent more letters to other professional quidditch teams. He wouldn't be able to pick where he was going to live until he knew which teams wanted him as a starting chaser.

The Potter solicitor was not moving fast enough of getting Remus out. It took over a week for the Lupins to admit they wanted help with an appeal. What was wrong with them? James was Remus' friend.

Next week, James was supposed to go with the solicitor to Azkaban to meet with Remus and his parents. He could not wait to see his best friend again. They were going to have so much fun once Remus was let out.

******************************************

Lily sighed. After twenty minutes of wrangling to get the color just right on these perfect robes, they were more money than her father had given her. She had a little of her own, but she was still short. Would the stores in Diagon Alley have something like these, or was she going to have to write her parents with the hope these would still be here?

She did not like Severus' choice. They were black. All black. Even the buttons were covered in the same black fabric. In a bad mood over her own robes, Lily groused, "We're going to a wedding not a funeral."

Severus' eyes met hers in the mirror. The corners of his mouth turned down, but he did not reply. He turned towards the saleslady and murmured something Lily could not make out. The shirt that was under the jacket sort of thing was transformed to the same green as Lily's robes and eyes. "Better?" he asked.

"It would be, but I'm not getting these."

"Why not? I thought you said you loved them, Lily."

"Too expensive."

"Those robes do look very nice on you. How much more do you need?"

"Too much. Another sixteen galleons."

"I might have enough."

"Where'd you get that?"

His eyes shifted slightly and one of his eyebrows twitched, before he asked, "Can we discuss that later?"

Lily frowned. Did Severus rob or blackmail someone? "You are going to have to let me pay you back."

"That's fine."

"You are going to need shoes too, Sev," Lily commented looking at the old pair of laced up boots he was wearing. Those were not his worst pair though. When did he get better old boots?

"I don't know if I have enough today for both our robes and shoes."

"How much are yours?"

"Why would it matter to you? I like them."

"I wasn't saying I did not like them, but maybe um … you know they are sort of plain."

"I don't want something stupid."

Severus' eyes did not have to indicate what he meant. The nearby Gladrags sock display was a tribute to offensiveness.

"I'm concerned about you overspending," Lily said, stepping closer to see the two of them together in the mirror. The shirt did make a difference. Subtle, since it could only be seen at his collar and cuffs.

"I should get a couple other shirts, perhaps?"

"White, if it's not too stark. Maybe something different for you? Purple?"

"Purple?" he sneered. Looking around he spied a maroon, sort of blood red, but enough blue hinted into it to keep it from being mistaken as a dark Gryffindor. "That," he pointed to it.

Lily's nose wrinkled, but when the saleslady transformed the shirt he had on to that color, Lily could see it was impressive in sort of a dark wizard, or Severus the Slimy, sort of way.

"Hm, I might have to get a robe with some of that color in it," she whispered to him. "Maybe not the whole thing because of my hair, but definitely noticeable."

"Maybe black with it at the hems with another complimentary color? That way it won't be close to your hair or eyes."

"Severus, do not talk about clothes around other people. I appreciate your input, but between this and you talking about Petunia's wedding gown, it's freaky."

"Why? Didn't I tell you this green color would be good for you?"

"It is, but boys do not talk about clothes."

The saleslady interrupted, "The young lady said you would be interested in shoes?"

"Do you have any with steel toes?"

Lily laughed, "That's more like it."

"Steel toes, sir?"

"Yes, metal to keep the wearer's toes safe."

"Like a protection charm to keep your feet dry and warm?"

"No, to save them from being crushed under large blocks of stone that fall out of castle ceilings on them."

"Ah, a joke?"

"No, I go to Hogwarts. The place is a dump that's falling apart."

From nowhere, someone said, "Tsk, tsk, tsk." It was that blonde reporter from Parkin's funeral. The same one that bothered him when he was grouting bathroom tile. She was behind a rack of robes, pulling out a notepad. "How often have these large blocks of stone fallen or almost fallen on a student, Severus?"

Puzzled that he had not seen her here, or heard the bell on the door, Severus muttered, "Only once on me and another student."

"Do you think something structural at the school may have been the cause of death of that boy in December?"

"Perhaps, but not likely."

Lily added, "He was frequently out of bounds. Pettigrew may not even have been at the school when he got hurt."

"Pettigrew? That name's familiar. Is he one of the boys that attacked muggles in a pub last summer? The same pub that Death Eaters killed your father and many others in February, Severus?"

"Yes."

"Any relation between the two incidents that you've noticed?"

"Merely unlikely the two incidents are not related. I was not at the location during either attack on muggles so I would not know."

"Wasn't it Black's family that was killed there?" Lily accused.

"Yes, his cousin and her relations were Death Eaters," Rita agreed. Bellatrix Black. Even now that she was dead, horribly and in pieces dead, Rita did not feel vindicated. She'd rather torture Bellatrix, but without her around, she'd settle for her family. "The Black family motto is _t__oujours pur_, or always pure. Not hard to imagine who they support."

"Regulus is alright," Severus mentioned.

"Yes," Lily agreed.

"Well, in that case, let us pray he lives to adulthood. His brother won't stay disinherited if he kills off the other heir, will he? If Sirius Black is capable of murder, that is. He fled the country before his trial to avoid Azkaban."

Lily thought about that. Sirius was rather nasty to his younger brother at school. Would he go as far to kill him though? He sent the whole lot of them to a werewolf so Lily would not put anything past Sirius Black. Did he even feel any remorse, while he ran off to get married? James Potter was as big a toerag as ever, only a month ago.

"That would be between the Blacks," Severus commented. Why would this woman care what he thought? Sirius Black was a killer. Any dunderhead knew that. He was in here to buy clothes, not talk.

"Do you feel the school is doing enough to protect students from Death Eaters? I noticed Horace Slughorn closely escorting young Regulus. Since your father may have been targeted by Death Eaters, has Mr. Slughorn taken the time to equally protect you, Severus?" Rita asked while acting like she was looking around for the potions master, who was as large as the rack she herself had been hiding behind.

"I should get back to making this purchase, rather than keeping this lady waiting," Severus said, intentionally turning back to the saleslady.

Rita raised an eyebrow at Lily. She was friendly and forthcoming, and from the matching colors, Snape's full-figured girlfriend. Evans had not been this fleshy at Parkin's funeral. Fat Gryffindors in girdles. She seemed more the mouthy sort, than a girl of action. Rita liked loose-lipped people. She complimented Lily, "That is a lovely robe. It suits you perfectly."

"Thank you. We're going to a wedding in July."

"Anyone I might know?"

"Frank Longbottom and Alice Oakby."

Rita smiled, even though Augusta Longbottom was an opinionated vulture. "How lovely. You two have any plans?"

"Us? We are a bit young."

"Holding out for someone wealthier?" Rita hinted. No self-respecting girl would borrow sixteen galleons from a hard-working, poor boy such as this. He was not going to have those pockmarks forever. His ugliness was slowly becoming part of his charm in Rita's eyes.

"That's not a very nice thing to say."

"Saving your life only once not good enough for you?" the reporter guessed. She doubted the problem was Snape since he obviously would give this floozy every coin he had. "I know how you Gryffindors are. That was six months ago, but what has he done for you lately?"

"Why are you being so confrontational? We're two seventeen year olds in our sixth year. There's no reason to rush."

"Too young to be a widow, you mean? Severus certainly has enemies. Enemies who have no qualms about killing seventeen year olds in sixth year."

"Stop saying that sort of thing," Lily replied, looking to see that Severus was still doing something else.

"Striking too close to home?" Rita angled. "Death Eaters, Sirius Black, the Ministry and who knows who else would rather he be permanently silenced."

"The Ministry?"

"Not the Ministry? They like seventeen years olds in sixth year questioning their policies? How do you think they suppressed that Death Eater attack in the paper. From what I heard, Snape's mother is dead due to that. Not very friendly."

"It wasn't the Ministry that did that. Dumbledore was told, and didn't bother to do anything about it."

"Albus Dumbledore?" Rita repeated. This was very interesting. "Why would he do that?"

"Because he's a self-centered old toerag who can't be burdened with any responsibility other than checking out what's for afters."

Agreeably, the older woman replied, "Well, Dumbledore is a little boy at heart. Why Snape though? He sent Slughorn to the Blacks for weeks, after Orion Black was murdered. Seems that the son of a Death Eater victim might be in more peril, or at least in my humble opinion. Two attacks on muggles in the same remote pub in one year suggests intent to me."

Lily frowned. The last thing she needed was Severus listening to this wild idea about being in danger from Death Eaters. He easily accepted any thought of people wanting to do him harm. Not without good reason. Obviously a lot of harm had been done to him in the past, and ill-intentioned men like Dumbledore were stalking him in the school corridors while invisible.

"Dumbledore has his favorites, and Severus is not one of them."

"Such a non-favorite as to wish a student's mother dead?"

"Perhaps not intentionally, but Severus exposed his favorite students as bullies and cowards. Sirius Black was Dumbledore's darling. Along with Remus Lupin and James Potter." Lily held back on Pettigrew's name since he could do no more harm.

"Rather like Horace Slughorn's practice of selecting a few favorites?" Rita suggested. She had not been a Slug Club member. Smug little arse kissers, the whole lot of them.

"Something like that, but Dumbledore only goes for the Gryffindor lads."

"Yes, he would try to rely on that hat picking out the heroic sort, rather than putting any real work into it, wouldn't he?"

"I suppose so. When they began in first year ganging up on others four on one, that should have been the first clue they possessed not a whit of bravery. They were still in the school after ripping open girls' blouses and blowing their skirts up in the air."

"Really? They did this to a couple students?"

"Oh no, they did it to every girl that caught their fancy. Even the head girl last year, Alice Oakby."

"Oh dear, and such a nice girl too," Rita said pleasantly, without the slightest clue if Oakby was or not.

"Right. Prof. McGonagall was looking to expel whoever it was when they were caught, but they wanted to look clever so at the end of the year, they revealed it was them in front of a lot of witnesses. Well, Dumbledore sorted it and nothing was done, so they were back at it this year till the werewolf."

"With such a history of tormenting others, it's little wonder they were so out of control."

"Exactly."

"You two are still talking? I've paid for your robe, Lily," Severus complained, already back to wearing his somewhat nicer Spinner's End clothing.

"But I didn't give you any money."

"When you aren't too busy, we can settle up."

"I got to change," Lily fretted.

"Alright then. Thank you for the leads," Rita pleasantly replied.

"What leads?" Lily asked.

"Shhh, but I need to verify the information. I can't just put anything in print and call it news, can I? If I did, my name would be Barnabas Cuffe," Rita laughed.

Yet another toerag, Lily miserably thought. Practically covered up the whole werewolf attack on Hogwarts' students.

Once she was changed, the saleslady was folding and boxing her robes when Lily handed Severus the money she had. After he counted it, he said, "I think you overcharged for those."

"No, she didn't. I uh … forgot I spent some of my money, so I was shorter than I thought, Sev. Is that alright? I'm positive my dad will send money to pay you back."

No wonder why Lily did not feel her time was worth fifty galleons. Instead of sixteen galleons, she now owed him a little over twenty-five. Severus knew her father would cover it, but the carefree attitude towards money was annoying. He may not know how many knuts he had in his pocket, but he had a general idea of how many sickles, and knew exactly how many galleons he had with him. "I might have to charge you interest," Severus bellyached.

"Interest? Sev, you are going to get paid back."

"Hey, I can buy a very good time for five sickles," he informed her.

"Five sickles? Oh! Well yes, by all means charge me interest," Lily agreed, realizing that she wanted to earn every sickle Sev had. Leaving Gladrags, she eyed several convenient spaces between buildings, but none were dark enough for her to 'work' in. "Do you see anyplace that's good?"

"For what?"

"Me to earn my sickles."

"Not here."

"You're no fun, Sev. So where did you get the money?"

Severus had already given his sudden access to money some thought. Completely hiding it would be deceitful, if Lily was going to find out one day. Besides, some galleons to spend on simple things would be nice. He couldn't tell her about it all because he knew she did not think well of his parents, and Severus did not want her to think his mother was a complete idiot. If he could forgive his mother, Lily had no right to judge her.

Mr. Evans already knew about the life insurance, and his solicitor was working on that. The muggle company would issue a check, and Gringotts knew what to do with those. "Some muggle thing called life insurance. My father had it."

"Really?" Lily asked enthusiastically. This could fix her Divination grade. "Was it a lot?"

"Father meant it for mother since she did not work, so it's enough for me to get through an apprenticeship," Severus replied, trying to make Lily realize that although the money was a stroke of good luck, that its receipt was based on the death of his parents.

"How much? Do we even have to bother working this summer?"

"I rather not pay someone to apprentice me. I'd rather get the recommendations and have them take me on for my own merit. If they take on anyone with money, their reputation is no good to me later."

"Pay? Won't we work while we're apprentices?"

"There's other ways to do it. Paying a large amount of money will find an opening somewhere. Grades or not. An apprenticeship is very negotiable."

"Well, won't the reputation of who they apprenticed reflect on them too?"

"Yes, it will, but money means more than reputation to some."

"That's so stupid. So how much is it?"

"Can't you trust that it's sufficient for me? There's enough for us to do some moderate travel this summer, and maybe next summer. I don't want to spend it quickly, since it may be a while before I have another offer of some employment."

"That's right. You will make fifty galleons if that guy hires us. Hmm, do you think we can afford a portkey to go somewhere distant for that last week of August?"

Severus could not believe Lily. Fifty galleons was nothing since she just spent more than that on dress robes. "Maybe. If we'd be traveling by Portkey, we can show up at the Ministry and see what's leaving soon. I'd rather wait to see how much homework we have. If we don't get the job, it should be complete in plenty of time. If we do, we might be finishing up still."

"Yeah, I guess you're right."

"If you don't like the sound of that, we can always request a schedule, and the prices for private portkeys, if you are dying to go somewhere special. I thought you'd like the sound of an unknown destination. More adventure?"

"I don't know. I'd have to see our choices."

"Until we go anywhere to know the destination, we can't use a _portus_ spell to create our own. The Ministry also has some sort of ban on everyday wizards doing that. Probably just to make more money. It can't be harder than apparating."

"Maybe because apparition wards don't work on portkeys?"

"Unquestionably a good point, but whoever would portkey into someone's house uninvited would hardly be worried about creating an illegal portkey."

"Oh no, you're going back to your old argument that laws only work on people who are afraid of getting caught, aren't you?"

"Am I? Perhaps you should never forget that."

"I don't think I will with all the murders going on, Sev."


	40. Chapter 40 Dark Arts are a Kinder Mistre

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 40 Dark Arts are a Kinder Mistress

Her father's letter was folded around seven purple, crisp, twenty pound notes. She double checked his math. Crap. She owed Sev this much? Well, a bit less, but her father wanted him to have the entire amount. Her father was angry that she borrowed this much money.

Lily did not appreciate her father's comment that finally working for her money would give her an understanding for it.

Her mother was just as scathing, but with a lot more words. Lily should not borrow so much money from Severus. Lily should not spend so much on one outfit. Once the price was converted from galleons to British pounds, her dress robes cost more than her bridesmaid's gown for Petunia's wedding, and her mother did not like that. Something how a wedding attendant should not outshine the bride or bridal party. Lily felt that if she'd wear these dress robes multiple times, they were worth more than a gown she'd only wear once.

Mrs. Evans was not as eager for Lily to work though. She wanted to know more details, but expressed her opinion that she felt safer knowing Severus would be there with her. What was that supposed to mean? Lily was competent. It's not like her potions ended up on the classroom ceiling, or lately, and that was only due to those stupid Marauders throwing things in the cauldron she shared with Severus, back when they were partners.

Finally, she closed by telling Lily to make sure Severus knew he was invited to Petunia's wedding. If Lily was going to be borrowing large sums of money from him, they should treat him more like family. Lily sneered at that. It was only once, and not that much money. It was more than she should have borrowed, but it sounded like less when it was in galleons. There were two letters for Prof. McGonagall covering both their absences from school, beginning a day before so Lily could practice with the rest of the group, and Severus could get some clothes sorted with her father's help.

God! They wrote to her like she was a seven year old, rather than seventeen. Old enough to be working, married and popping out squalling babies.

Severus initially looked annoyed, but said he'd attend. When Lily said he did not have to, he replied that he should since Petunia was now one of the people he had known longest. Lily supposed that was true.

With regards to Petunia's wedding, Severus thought it odd to be invited so much later than the others. At the Evans', he thought he overheard over a hundred people were invited, so his presence should not cause a major snit for Petunia, since so many well-wishers should block him from her view. Since this was a muggle ceremony, he needed more clothes, and yet another gift. Having acquaintances was expensive.

Would attending two weddings get Lily thinking about marriage? Maybe Longbottom's would be in a style she'd prefer. Severus had heard Lily complain multiple times that Petunia's extravagance was wasteful. It did not sound much different than when Rosier spoke about his sister, or was it sisters? At least one of them was married, and it sounded comparable in scale. From what he overheard in Slytherin, it was better to spend more, invite more, and receive more presents, besides a degree of family honor. Severus had not considered it important because he had no one to invite, other than his parents. He envisioned leaving it up to Lily, who'd invite her family and whatever friends could tolerate the sight of him. That would result in a small gathering, not Petunia's hundred, or the Slytherin habit of inviting everyone with a familiar last name.

Perhaps she would look at Vernon Dursley and Frank Longbottom and consider that Severus was not like either of them. Dursley was nothing like Longbottom physically, but both were comfortable talking to others. Dursley told stories and jokes, while Longbottom talked about anything that caught his fancy, mostly Oakby and the Ministry. Severus did not mind conversing on subjects that interested him and the group, but Lily would interrupt him when she was present. Then later, she'd follow up by accusing him of being antisocial. For the most part he was, since many topics of conversation were trivial to him and not worth discussing, such as the weather.

Another week into May, Severus received the reply from Regulus Moonshine. The potioneer was agreeable to both of them working for the joint wage, for no more than fifty hours a week with Saturdays and Sundays off. Moonshine said his house was already full of family, and listed everyone from his mother-in-law on down. Severus sneered as he scanned through the letter to find the part that mattered. He and Evans would need to share a small lodging a short walk from the main house. Severus was suspicious that this lodging was never meant to be used for habitation, like a potting shed. The man gave too many details setting up the announcement of quarters.

Lily agreed when she read through the letter, but had been mulling over Severus' idea of spending so much time together. Her parents did not need to know they'd be sleeping together, so she did not have to make up some story to cover up. She'd have to do that if Sev and her were going to live together over the summer, without the work. Also, the thought of any holiday with him that went overnight. Her mother would want to know where they were staying.

The big advantage of living with Sev would be the sex. There was also finding out more about him, other than he snored, drooled, made his bed at Spinner's End, and did not leave dirty laundry lying about.

The disadvantages Lily foresaw was she'd be spending a lot of time with him. They'd be working, eating and sleeping together. Lily liked things her way. She knew Sev knew that, but there might be something that rubbed him the wrong way that he could not ignore. Likewise, he could get on her nerves too. If that did not happen, the argument was sure to be over why Lily would not agree that the two of them were perfect together and should married right away.

Lily knew Miss Skeeter was trying to provoke a response from her. Must be a habit she got into to become a good investigative reporter. Prod someone till they gave you information. Well, she needed to relearn some manners and talk normal when she was not interviewing, rather than trying to start something. Anyway, she had mentioned Lily not wanting to become a widow. All things considered, Lily had to admit there was a possibility that people hated Severus that much. Not the general hate that was normally directed at him because he simply existed, but the kind that made people go out of their way and plan horrible crimes.

She could be letting her imagination get the better of her, but Sirius Black was who she considered as the biggest threat. Lily had discarded James Potter, since at the Ministry he was just his usual toerag self. Black came from a family who's motto was 'always pure'. The pureblood crap that the Death Eaters followed. He was sorted into Gryffindor, but that did not mean he was a good guy. When he said he was not like the rest of his family, he was lying because he was surrounded by mudbloods and half-bloods in Gryffindor. Black lied all the time. Black might simply be bolder than the typical Black who was sorted into Slytherin. One did not need to look any further than all the spells he cast at other students to tell he was no hero. He wanted everyone to know what a bastard he was.

After having his liberties curtailed, Black became too bored to stay at school, and tried to get Severus killed. He probably had his escape to France already planned, if Sev didn't mysteriously disappear, when he was eaten by Lupin. Black's plan sort of failed, he was exposed and he fled.

Since then, how did they know Black was not in England? Someone killed Pettigrew. What if he was out of bounds and saw Black? Did Pettigrew offer his silence for a price, or did Black kill him to guarantee he'd never talk?

Black's family was at the pub and killed Sev's father along with a lot of other muggles. Was Black there too? The lack of reporting by the paper was worse than their sorely lacking story about the werewolf attack. Death Eaters killing muggles so openly, and two Death Eaters getting killed was news. Once Mr. Snape was dead, all Black would only need to wait around for Severus to come home for the funeral, where he would be unprotected and surrounded by only muggles. No one could have predicted the school being so incompetent.

The likeliest proof that Black was occasionally in England was the murder of his father, who supposedly disinherited him and cut off his money. Perhaps he did not like Regulus being the official Black family heir. He certainly never showed any affection for his younger brother at Hogwarts. Although they were only rumors, some of the Gryffindors would receive news of Black being sighted somewhere in Europe, living lavishly, as he traveled with his wife. Was that contradicting that he had no money, or a show to provide him with an alibi as being somewhere other than England?

Then Slughorn, either on Dumbledore's advice or not, followed Regulus home, even over Easter break. Regulus would be next on Black's list of victims, unless Severus exposed himself. Severus was more of a personal vendetta, rather than ensuring Black nearly limitless wealth. Would Black also kill his mother? Or would he have the money once Regulus was dead?

Lily's brain had been churning because there was a lot of banter about the Lestrange vault. Apparently they were a very old family, like the Blacks, and now they were all dead. Although it did not effect her, she could hope that the person that did inherit it was not a scheming murderer, like the former owners. That was unlikely since all those Slyterin pureblood families were interrelated, and it would probably go to the Black family, or the Mulcibers or the Averys of the world. She wished it did not go to the Wilkes family. It's not that she didn't think Malcolm could be a nice fellow, but that would absolutely crush Mary. She was still hurting while pretending she was quietly fancying Severus. Now and then, Mary would cry over it. It was not only because she turned into a werewolf, but she'd never have any children of her own. Lily knew from first year that's all Mary wanted, to get married and have children. Helen's dream was playing quidditch. Lily hoped it was her that caught Sirius Black. He had a lot to pay for.

**************************************

Remus looked horrible. His shoulders were slumped, his feet shuffled as he slowly came into the room, his eyes were downcast, and his friend had a few grey hairs on his head. He looked worse than if he just transformed back into a person.

The Potter solicitor had to get his friend out of here. He did not belong in Azkaban.

"Remus!" James called, hiding his concern over Moony's appearance. Once he was out of here, had a couple house elves stuffing him with food and fluffing his pillows, he'd look much better.

Rather than responding, Remus listlessly moved to the straight-backed chair. A comfort he did not enjoy in his cell.

Mrs. Lupin went over to him. "James Potter wants his family's legal representative to file an appeal on your behalf, Remus."

"Why? I'm a murderer."

"No, you're not, Moony. You weren't responsible for your actions. You were used like a weapon. If someone casts a killing curse, they go to Azkaban, not their wand," James pleaded. "You need to answer some questions and then the paperwork can be filed at the Ministry."

"Why now? Where were you, James? Where were you?"

"I accept whatever blame you lay at my feet, Remus. I can only say now that I'm seventeen, I can take some responsibility. Before then, I may have been a coward. I did not know, and I should have cared more to find out."

"All of it, James," Remus broke out in tears. "Not only at the trial, before that. You knew that Sirius told, and you knew I was a werewolf. Why would you let innocent people come walking in there when you knew?"

"I knew, but I didn't know … ugh, it's hard. Now, it's easy to see. I should have punched out Filch and gotten hauled up to the headmaster and told him everything. You would have been safe, they would have been safe, and Sirius and I would have gotten punished, but no one would have been killed."

"That's not what you wanted. You wanted me to kill."

"No! Listen to yourself. It's this place. Why would I lose my best friend over some silly schoolboy rivalry? You mean more to me than all that, Moony."

Remus sniffed, "Maybe. The dementors … they have me thinking terrible things about me, about you, about everyone."

"Because that's what you fear most, Remus. You are not a monster, but that's what you are afraid of. You are a good person, kind and loyal, and my best friend."

"No, no. Padfoot is."

"I was a fool, Moony. From now on, it's you and me. I don't care that you are quiet. And I love that you think before acting. You are who I need. Not some idiot that hexes first and damns the consequences. Running away when the time for friendship counts. That's why we're here now, and we going to fix this."

More tears flowed from Remus' eyes, "I'm dreaming this, aren't I? I'm lying in my cell, delirious with the fever that's spreading through the prisoners here."

"Hell no," James said and punched Remus in the arm. "If I wasn't here, would you have felt that?"

Remus snorted, "It's traditional to pinch, not punch."

"Pinches are for wusses. You are made of tougher stuff than that, Moony."

**************************************

Lily was rolling her eyes over a letter from her mother that included her itinerary for the wedding of the century. Gown, rehearsal, rehearsal dinner, nails, hair, makeup … her every sodding minute was planned.

Severus foresaw trouble from the way Lily was waving around a piece of paper as she approached him. "Can you believe this?" she asked while keeping the list in motion so he could not honestly agree or disagree. "This is no fun at all. Why do I have to do anything for Tunie's stupid wedding?"

"You love her."

Lily huffed at him. "Love? If Petunia loved me, she wouldn't be doing all this crap."

"Perhaps your mother felt you could be depended on … to have your hair done?" he asked, catching sight of one of the items. Severus remembered in the Lily's list of complaints that she had to keep her hair long because the ladies were having some sort of style with flowers in it. At the time, Severus did not see the problem since Lily hardly ever got her hair trimmed. So on the wedding day, why was hair fixing, or whatever it was called, unexpected?

"What? Look at this," Lily said, now putting the paper in front of his eyes. "Rehearse. Can't they just tell me where to stand? The whole group then has to go to dinner. And look, it's for hours. Then the next day we have all morning scheduled going to the salon for nails, hair and makeup."

"One place?" Severus asked.

"Yeah, for hours. I'll be trapped with those chatting twits all morning."

"Perhaps you could look at this from the opposite direction, Lily? During this final twenty-four hours, every hour that passes will bring you closer to it being over."

She snarled, "But I could be studying. I should be compensated in some way for my investment in this."

Lily was barking mad. Telling her the truth that she was jealous of her older sister being the center of attention would not be wise.

"What's this reception thing after the ceremony? That's for hours too."

"A party. We're fed and dance."

"Dance?"

"You know. You saw them practicing a couple summers ago."

"I don't remember it well since I only tried it for an hour. Am I required to participate?"

"Who else am I supposed to dance with then? My father doesn't dance the discofox."

"Are we going to practice any? I realize studying is more important, but if I'm suppose to dance with you, I don't want to trip over you or something equally ungraceful."

"I don't remember a lot either," Lily complained. "There's also slow dancing. Do you know any of that?"

"What's that?"

"You know. Slower music, and close together dancing like they do in the movies."

"No, I don't. There's a record player with a crank, rather than electricity, upstairs. If there's no good records with it, Mr. Filch has a lot of them. Maybe he'd let me borrow some."

"What? For me to teach you?"

"You wouldn't?"

"The guys lead, Sev. You're the one that needs to know it."

He doubted that. During his brief lesson on discofox, the female partners were fully participating. "I guess you will have to dance with someone else. I do not know any dances."

"Sev, that's the whole point of the reception," Lily pouted.

Surely, Lily was exaggerating. If dancing was so important, it would have been mentioned prior to today as one of her many complaints. Before Severus was invited, Lily was going to dance with someone else. Whoever he or they were, they could still dance with Lily.

Fortunately, he was currently on speaking terms with Evan Rosier to find out. Rosier clarified not everyone danced. He never heard of discofox. He did know slow dancing, but was unsure if muggles dance the same ones, and it would be awkward to instruct Severus since they were both male so they took over Severus' study group's corner of the common room with a wireless turned low, and Regulus and Barty were good sports to dance with each other. Some of the girls were game to dance with the fellows, and soon they had enough students dancing in couples with the wireless turned up that it seemed like a spontaneous gathering, rather than Severus asking for instruction.

He learned a few things. First off, younger girls overlooked his ugliness just for the opportunity to dance with a sixth year, as opposed to a second or third year that they did not fancy. Severus did not have to do much. Some of the blokes just moved with the music. As long as they did not limit themselves to shifting their weight from their left to right foot and then back, they appeared like they were dancing. With a partner's cooperation, couples could move around like they knew what they were doing. So he could basically fake slow dancing, unless muggles did something different.

There was a couple simple dances that he learned that were based on the tempo of the music. Luckily, more girls than boys wanted to dance so he could always manage to find a partner. Younger girls were willing to show him where to go, and he really felt Lily had it wrong. Females could lead just as well as males, even if they were more than a head shorter than him and could not see where they were going.

Mr. Filch also had something to add regarding slow dances. He had records for Severus to listen to so he'd recognize the right cadences for specific dances. Unlike the Slytherins, there was no practical demonstration, other than Mr. Filch stepping through the male half while holding Mrs. Norris and staring into her big, orange eyes. Perhaps the looking into a partner's eyes part was good, if Severus chose to dance with a person, rather than an animal. He did not practice with Phi.

**************************************

Soon enough, the two of them left to go home for Petunia's wedding. There had been no more spontaneous dances in the Slytherin common room, but Severus was at least sure he would not stand around like a pillock in the middle of everyone else. If he had to dance that is, he would remain undecided until he observed others.

Lily was whisked away by her mother, and her father invited him upstairs. Leading the way, Mr. Evans commented, "I have a few sports jackets I've outgrown. Maybe one won't be too large for you, Severus."

Sports? Severus thought to himself silently. He'd have to see it to recognize what Lily's father meant by that name. If he had a number of them, it was undoubtedly something a muggle usually wore.

Lily's parents' bedroom was big. Their bed was big too, not just the regular size for two people that Severus' parents had. Rather than wood, it was that white metal that the infirmary beds were made of, but with gold knobs and other decorative things. It was very well-lit with bright sunlight, and with all the white and flowered prints on white, Severus had to admit that overall he did not like it. In fact, it was just as feminine looking as Petunia's and Lily's rooms with its frills and white eyelet lace.

The room also had multiple mirrors, even on the sliding door of the closet Mr. Evans was currently opening. The large closet that was built into the wall was full of only his clothes. It was precisely organized, even with raised shelves to see the shoes in the back, rather than laying them all out on the floor. There was even a light in here above the rack where he stored his neckties. It was filled to capacity, and there were dozens of them.

Considering the amount of clothing stored here, perhaps he had kept something from when he was ten or twelve, when his shoulders were as narrow as Severus' currently were.

Mr. Evans was sliding suit jackets on hangers along the railing they hung from. There were some ugly plaid ones among them. When he pulled one out, Severus supposed he misheard what was said earlier. These were not for playing sports in, and now it made better sense.

"You can pretty much wear anything with a pair of black slacks and a white shirt, Severus. We'll pick you out a tie too."

Severus frowned at the first two jackets. Just because he could wear anything, didn't mean he should. He muttered, "I like black."

Displaying the same ability to not listen to him as Lily, Mr. Evans held up a jacket in front of him that had no black at all. It contained several other colors though.

"I have a new shirt that I could wear, instead of a white one."

"Is it black?"

"No, it's sort of red and blue. I have my trunk with me, if it's alright to enlarge it here."

"Let me shut the door first. Vernon and his mates are staying at a hotel, but they might come over."

After the door was closed, Severus enlarged his trunk, removed the wards and opened it. The shirts were in the flat specialized bag from Gladrags with his dress robes. He also took out his new boots. They only covered to above his ankle, however they looked nice with his robes, even when he sat.

Mr. Evans saw more books and paper than Lily's trunk. Hers was more clothes. She said the girls she roomed with did something with theirs to enlarge them inside to hold entire closets. He was disappointed that Severus did not have that done with his trunk, but he supposed he had no need for that sort of thing. The shoes were alright, depended on the hem on the trousers whether ankle boots would work or not. He peered into the bag that Severus was opening. It was too big for just a new shirt.

"That green shirt is quite nice," Mr. Evans commented, seeing the one that was on top.

"It matches Lily's dress robes, so I shouldn't wear that now. She might not like that."

"Women."

"This is the one I meant," Severus said, bringing the maroon one out.

"That's quite a color, or two colors. Is it magic?"

"I don't think so. There's two colors in the weave, rather than a charm creating it."

Mr. Evans leaned forward to study it in the sunlight. "Alright, I see that so that's good. I'm not sure I have a jacket to go with this. What's this behind it?"

"That's my dress robes."

"Oooh, is this silk?" he asked, running his hand across the black fabric.

Severus sighed, "I would have preferred wool, but the first time I'm wearing them is at a wedding in July. It's heavier though, so it should be alright for winter too."

"Do you remember what this fabric's called? I like it." Obviously, in a different color. A cocktail dress for his wife would be really nice in this.

"Uh, doopee something ee."

With an indrawn breath, Mr. Evans turned back to his closet. Blue. He had blue. He looked back at the shirt. "The collar's wrong for a tie."

"The robes button up to my neck."

"That might be alright. You're young. I know it's not cool to wear a tie."

Maybe Severus should be looking forward to this being over, along with Lily. Why was her father talking to him about muggle fashion? Especially when Mr. Evans had no eye for color, proven when he pulled out a horrible blue and yellow jacket. Since he owned this collection of clothing, probably all bought new, Severus did not want to wear what he thought looked good.

"I prefer something plain."

"Hmm, I have this one black jacket as part of my funeral suit, but it's actually a little roomy in the shoulders on me."

"I can fix it, but maybe I can see if there's one I can buy when I shop for Petunia's gift. Lily said there's a list?"

"Oh, a gift? Uh, I suppose. It's all rather expensive with Petunia's taste running to the finer things. I guess we can stop in there when we go for a haircut after lunch."

Severus stared at Mr. Evans. He did not agree to a haircut. He was not even asked. "I'm not letting someone cut my hair."

"It's long. I know you've always worn it long, Severus, but you are getting a little old for that uh, bohemian look."

"I don't care. I don't want it cut."

Mr. Evans did not want to argue with Severus. Normally, the boy just went along with whatever his wife suggested. Maybe she'd have to tell him to get his hair cut.

"Well, I can take you by the store where Petunia's registered, but you don't need to buy her any of those items."

"Which one is it? I can get there on my own so I don't take up any more of your time, Mr. Evans. You doubtless have a lot on your hands."

He laughed, "Not really. They want me to stay out of their way. I write the checks when I'm told. Tell you what, um, be back here by eight tonight. We'll probably still be at that dinner, but after that I'm invited to the bachelor party. It should be on the tame side if I'm there, or at least I hope. I can drive you there and back."

"Party? That wasn't on Lily's list."

"Men only. Acting silly, the night before the groom gets married."

"I don't act silly."

"That's the most fun. You watch others acting silly."

Severus clarified, "Not in a bad way?" He was confused. Was it some sort of ritual to act immature before marrying? Is that why people were invited to watch? There were different flavors of fun when observing others. He did not know Mr. Evans well, and Vernon Dursley hardly at all, but Petunia knew Severus enough that if something went wrong, he'd take the blame.

"No, they wouldn't have me along if it was that sort of bachelor party."

"I'd rather not."

"Nonsense, Severus. Bad enough we have to dress up tomorrow, act our best and use all our table manners."

Until Lily found this new person she'd marry, Severus could go along with some of the things her father suggested, as long as getting his hair cut off did not come up again. Maybe at some point in the future, Lily's parents would remind her in some manner how he was in any way better than the man she married. Even if it was to patiently watch some muggle do foolish things. If Mr. Evans was there tonight, he could explain some of the muggle things that he did not know. "Alright, I'll be back at eight."

On his own, Severus was able to get a black suit jacket and had the registry clarified. Everything on it was something Petunia definitely wanted, including the right color or size. The store kept track of what was already purchased so she would not receive multiples of one item. Considering it was the day before the wedding, Severus was surprised so many things for her kitchen were still not bought from her list. He had enough muggle money on him, thanks to Mr. Evans paying him back through Lily, to purchase the odd looking pot called a pressure cooker with the canning things that went with it. He knew Mrs. Evans spent whole days canning and making preserves with Petunia's help. Lily did not care for it much because there was messy work involved, but Severus did find it interesting that they could pack their own food to last a long time, besides buying it in cans from the store. He actually wanted to experiment with it to see if it could effect potion brewing. What if he could brew something that needed months, or the really rare ones that needed years, in a fraction of the time? He needed to understand the workings of pressure better to express it arithmantically. Mrs. Evans brief explanation of additional pressure meant the cooked faster due to the higher temperature was inadequate.

This store pretty much did everything, including wrapping it in appropriate paper for a wedding and assisting with picking the right kind of card to attach. Petunia had done all the work of making the list, and all he had to do was come in here with the money. He wished Longbottom had done something like this, but it might be impractical since there was no wizarding version of a department store. That might be the true test of a couple – choosing to make a list at Flourish and Blotts, Honeydukes, Quality Quidditch Supplies, Zonko's or Slug and Jiggers.

With trepidation, Severus waited in a chair on the front porch of the Evans' house that evening. Party with only men doing silly things. He could find no way of imagining anything other than the way Lily described her male housemates sullying the Gryffindor common room.

Both Lily and Petunia loudly protested Mr. Evans taking Severus with him, when they arrived home and found him waiting. Mrs. Evans was not as loud, but she had her doubts as well. It was alright for a married man such as her husband to view some racy pictures or see a stag film, but Severus? She doubted he was uninformed about such things, but since his best friend was their daughter, it was rather irresponsible to be putting such images in front of him. She doubted he was close to any other girls, or she would have gotten an earful from Lily.

Firstly, Petunia did not want Severus having a good time. In fact, he shouldn't be here at all, but back at that freak school. Secondly, what if he did some freak thing in front of Vernon and his old mates from Smeltings? They could only get so drunk since they had a big day ahead of them tomorrow.

Lily did not want Severus looking at other women in any way. Either in photos, films or in person. There'd probably be drinking too. What if Sev said something? It could be anything. Blokes were pigs when they got together. If Severus knew stuff that he shouldn't know, or compared something he saw to Lily's, her father could … she did not know what he could do. He could hit Severus before he got his wand out to defend himself. Her father could tell her mother. He could ground her. Vernon could tell Petunia and she'd laugh her head off, grin at her all day tomorrow, and call her a depraved Spinner's End slut again.

Mr. Evans waved off the complaints, "It's tradition, and I needed company for the ride over and back." Really now, Severus was taking an almost grown man, who by all rights was now on his own. What was a couple beers, a cigar, and a pack of nude playing cards, or whatever these Smeltings lads planned for their wild evening?

Lily tried to grab his elbow to take him inside the house, but Mr. Evans said, "I already told them he's coming, Lily, so let him go."

"But … Sev, you don't want to go," Lily said, appealing to Severus to heed her, rather than listening to her father.

"Why?" he asked. This was making it more interesting. Was this ritual something that was supposed to change him in some way? If it was for men only, did Lily even know what happened at it, or was it another of her unfounded ideas? Like all Slytherins joined up with He Who Must Not Be Named right after they were Sorted?

"They have a no freaks rule," Petunia replied nastily. She had not been keen on Vernon and his bachelor party, however as her father said, it was tradition. Probably just them sitting around drinking, smoking and telling stupid stories about women they dreamed about, but who would never talk to them.

Severus quirked an eyebrow at the elder Evans girl. He buys her the pressure cooker of her dreams and she still treats him like rubbish, was the amused thought going through his mind. He knew that he had not given the gift yet, and it was unlikely to be the nicest thing she received tomorrow. However, Petunia was a bit like Lily. Nothing Severus could do would be good enough for them.

He did not resist as Mr. Evans pulled him out of Lily's grasp and down the stairs towards his car. Severus nodded and made noise of agreement as Lily's father kept up a one-sided conversation about his silly girls on the short drive.

It was easy for Severus to keep quietly in the corner of the room with a bottle of ale, while the fellows played drinking games in the middle, centered around Vernon. About half of them had gone to school with the groom, and a few times their school song was song poorly. Severus did not bother to complain since his school song did not have any music, just words sung any old way. It was rather nice that Vernon seemed popular with his old school chums and that they were not picking on any of the other blokes in the room. Instead they were bonding over a never ending flow of liquor and boisterous tales.

A woman was admitted to the room wearing a ridiculous constable outfit. Except for it being blue, it shared little in the way of a real one except for the handcuffs and stick on her belt. The shirt was only held close by two buttons, obviously sewn on with extra strength thread.

Her pantomime was supposed to be exciting, yet the men put on the better show for her, rather than her for them. Vernon was eager to be cuffed to his chair, and the woman climbed onto him facing away, and ground her arse onto his crotch while oohing and ahing at her nightstick that she held in front of her, kissing it, and finally sticking the end in her mouth. Her next act was to take off her blouse, expose herself to the crowd, turn around and try to suffocate Vernon with her ample chest.

Severus almost got dragged into the center for her encore as the youngest there, but when she questioned his age, he was passed over for truthfully answering seventeen in favor of one of the fellows who had the title of 'best man'. It was fortunate for him because she got pretty disgusting with running her tongue all over Vernon and his friend while fluttering her eyes, grasping her own breasts, rubbing the front of her knickers and moaning unconvincingly.

He had to admit, after this woman, even Petunia in her apron and ridiculous, elbow-length, yellow rubber gloves would look sexy. Hell, her snipes of 'freak' were sexier than the noises this slattern was making. She also had the largest pimple he had ever seen on her dimpled arse cheek, and that was a popular jinx for about a month so he had seen quite a few unnaturally enormous ones that resembled flesh and pus volcanoes.

Finally, her hour or whatever she was paid for was up, she dressed, took a tip from one of the guys and left. The drinking resumed in earnest, and they talked about the hired woman in terms that in no way truthfully described her. Severus imagined they must be what was called 'blind drunk', and also 'hearing drunk' because they were conversing about what this so-called beauty said as she flirted with all of them.

After that finished, the real silly, or as Severus saw them, stupid things, began. Predictably, it ended badly with broken glass, screams, blood, and a reddening white towel wrapped around Vernon's left hand.

Mr. Evans, as the soberest in the room besides Severus, took charge. However, he did not behave in a predictable manner. He pushed Vernon into the bathroom and hauled Severus in there, commenting, "Severus is great with first aid."

"Me?" Severus protested.

"Yes, don't be modest. If we need to take him for stitches we will, but you should look at it first. Right?" To the others, he said, "Excuse us," before shutting the door and locking it.

"What's going on? Do you go to medical school or something?" Vernon slurred.

"Sit down," Mr. Evans instructed him. "You might need to be let in on something a day early. Severus, that's his ring hand. Can you fix it?"

"What's the other option?"

"All night at a hospital and they'd probably sew it up with thick, black thread, and it'll be bandaged up. Petunia and my wife won't like it."

"Let me look at it first," Severus muttered, holding out his hand for Vernon's injured one.

"Lily said you fixed up that girl that was attacked with her."

"Not really. I stopped her bleeding to death."

"Wow," Vernon commented. It was not clear if he was commenting on Severus saving someone from bleeding to death, or the sight of his own wound.

"This is just a normal cut. Deep. I guess I could … if Vernon wouldn't mind. For Petunia that is. You understand that, Dursley?"

"What?"

"Don't pay attention to what Severus is doing. We can explain tomorrow," Mr. Evans said while grabbing Vernon's chin and tilting his head up.

"What's he going to do?"

"Fix your hand."

"_Accio _glass." Severus sent the pieces over to the sink.

"I felt that."

"If it hurts, it'll stop after I do the next part," Severus mentioned. "It'll sound like I'm singing to your hand, but don't interrupt. Alright?"

"Why would you do that?"

"Don't worry about Severus. He does strange, but good, things. This is an emergency, or Petunia will kill us."

"No kidding."

Vernon looked down, despite Mr. Evans trying to get him to look up. Petunia's sister's friend was holding a stick over his hand. Where'd he get a stick in a hotel bathroom? He was chanting some nonsense, and he could see the wound closing. What had Petunia said? He'd burst into flames if he went into a church? Oh no. "You're a devil worshiper?"

"No, he's not, Vernon. It's hard to explain when you're tipsy. Lily can do it too."

Severus looked up and shook his head. Finishing Vernon's hand, he mentioned, "She can't do it yet. Lily wants to though. Just so you know before you ask her to heal something."

"Well, she can do other things," Mr. Evans informed Vernon.

"It's not a worship or religion. More like being able to tap into natural forces," Severus explained. "It's a secret, but even someone that can heal up a hand would be afraid of Petunia. It might even be better to say nothing now, and act surprised after you're married when they tell you about Lily. She won't like it that you hurt your hand, or that we ruined her moment to let you in on the secret."

"Oooh," Vernon responded thoughtfully. "Yeah, Petunia likes to do things her way."

"Right," her father agreed.

"And if you didn't know, she's not fond of me so she won't like it that I helped you cover up that you hurt your hand, Vernon," Severus hinted.

"My ring hand," Vernon explained, and held it up. Amazing. There was only redness. Not even a scab.

**************************************

At last, the day of Petunia's stupid wedding dawned. It was one problem after another for Lily.

She fixed her gown yesterday when she put it on for the final fitting using magic. If she was not seventeen, Lily had no idea what she would have done. The nitwitted shop had taken it in too much. Once it was taken in like that, they could not make it bigger again without ripping the darned thing apart.

The rehearsal last night had been really boring. She could have figured out that she needed to go down the aisle at a ladylike pace, and they showed her where she was to stand and sit. They were there another hour to do all the other practicing before they went to dinner at a Chinese restaurant. It was a slow, sit down place and their table had so many people at it that it took a long time to order and get served, and everyone was talking so much, they took forever to eat.

Then her blockheaded father invited Severus to Vernon's bachelor party. Lily had stayed up, but her father had dropped off Severus on their way home, closer to Spinner's End. She didn't know why he would do such a thing. Severus hated ruddy parties and having to be social with people. He had nothing in common with anyone that would have been there.

And now this morning, Lily was going to be trapped with all the women getting all primped and whatever, including Vernon's sister and mother. In her opinion, those two needed miracles since they hadn't even bothered to shave their mustaches in advance. They were lucky in one way. Neither of them was being forced to wear pink.

She had no idea if she'd see Severus between now and the church, and Lily did not even know if her father picked out something for him to wear that he liked. Maybe he needed help with something.

By the time Lily was at the church, sequestered in a room with Petunia and the other pink-clad ninnies, her eyes were aching from rolling and looking up all morning. Petunia looked lovely. If she could shut up, she'd be perfect.

She spent some time staring at her flowers. A tight, compact bundle of pink and white rose buds. If Lily had thought of it in advance, she could have saved her family some money by transfiguring flowers for them.

The wedding itself happened just as planned, and then Lily was off with the others for photos before the reception. In less than six hours, all this would finally be over, and Petunia and Vernon would be gone.

**************************************

Severus was seated in the church to watch Petunia's wedding. The ceremony was kind of on the long side with a lot of promises being repeated by Petunia and Vernon. They did not seem special. Actually, they seemed rather self-evident. It was rather foolish to think they'd marry to abandon the other as soon as a difficulty arose. He knew Lily had told him about muggles undoing marriages, but he did not understand that. With all these vows they were taking, how would that be possible?

When the ceremony inside was over, he followed the others outside. They were standing around so he joined them and was handed some grains of rice. He threw them when everyone else did. Lily looked unhappy when she came out. Had something gone awry that he hadn't noticed? Her dress, hair and whatever else looked fine. Everyone's still did. Petunia was smiling. Vernon and Lily's parents were smiling.

Once everyone started dispersing, Severus strolled around the building away from the parking lot to apparate. He had plenty of time to make sure he was not under observation.

**************************************

At the reception, Lily was sitting with her family and the other members of the bridal group, including Vernon's male friends in tuxedos. They were immature, but they were not throwing food around or trying to stick it to the ceiling.

She could see Severus seated at a table in the back. He was wearing his dark wizard shirt with a black jacket that fit well. How did her father let him get away with not wearing a tie? He seemed alright since he was not sneering at anyone and anything in his vicinity. He was looking around, probably studying wedding details. Lily could only imagine what he was thinking. He was near enough to Petunia's mountain range of presents to form some sort of opinion. Undoubtedly negative, since they were for Petunia.

Lily wouldn't want all this for her wedding. She'd want a party with food and dancing, of course. And presents, but not all that. And better food and more of it. This entree wasn't enough to fill a cavity. She agreed with Vernon's friends on that point. A buffet might be messier, but she and the guests would have been able to have as much as they liked. Maybe someone carving a roast of beef, a ham and perhaps a turkey. Yeah, Lily would like all those at her wedding reception, and maybe some roast pork loin. That'll show Petunia.

Her mother already had informed her that for the first dance with everyone that she had to dance with one of Vernon's tuxedoed friends, had to dance at least once with her father, and then Lily could dance with whoever she liked. God! She needed another drink. In less than four hours, Petunia would be in a car on her way to the airport. That couldn't come soon enough for her.

Severus gleaned soon enough that the group at his table were here individually. The single table. He sensed Mrs. Evans' hand in making sure it was five males and five females, seated alternately boy, girl, boy, girl. If Petunia had to accept he was here, she would have arranged for this little card with his name, or perhaps her affectionate nickname for him of 'freak', to be in a toilet stall … in a public loo down the street.

Some of these people were local so knew him by reputation as the filthy Snape boy from Spinner's End. They behaved themselves, but he saw the initial looks of disgust followed by surreptitious glances. His satisfaction sprung from knowing that they were thinking that the Evans thought so little of them, they were seated at the same table as him. Nine poor people condemned to hell on earth till custom allowed them to leave the table. Delighted, Severus ordered another ale.

After the plates were cleared, music started. The next phase of this reception ceremony was starting, with Vernon leading Petunia to the center of the wooden floor that the tables surrounded. That gown's style was ideal for Petunia. She also had a radiant expression on her face, unlike Lily's open-mouthed look of boredom as she rested the side of her face on her hand, with her elbow propped on the table. There was an announcement that this was their first dance as a married couple as the music changed. Petunia and Vernon looked into each other's eyes, and slowly moved about the floor.

Other couples joined them, including Lily. He knew someone would dance with her, if he couldn't. They weren't even doing any special steps, just navigating in time with the music to avoid collisions.

After the first song was over, Lily came over to him. Sighing and rolling her eyes, she said, "It's all downhill from here. I wish they'd cut the cake already."

"Did you want to dance?" Severus asked.

Lily made a face, directed more at the crowd out on the dance floor, rather than Severus, and answered, "No." She didn't want to dance with any more of Vernon's friends.

"Alright." He was glad he had not invested more time in order to gain more skill. Lily was so contrary.

"Did you see all that?" Lily inquired, pointing at the presents.

"Yes, I am seated close to them."

"Are you drinking?"

"Only ale."

Lily crossed her arms over her chest, then commented, "I supposed you drank last night too."

"Only three bottles. That's less than one an hour."

"What else happened last night?"

"I believe there's a muggle code wherein I'm sworn to secrecy."

"Very funny, Sev. So you were bored?"

"Yes."

"What about today?"

"I would not want to make it a habit to attend these, but one's alright."

"Hmm," Lily murmured in reply. "They haven't even wheeled the cake out yet."

"Is it special?"

"It's the wedding cake, Sev. It's a big deal. You'll see. You might have to eat a forkful of yours to look polite."

"Alright."

Lily frowned at him. Sev did not have to be on his best behavior with her. Right now, she'd relish his honesty and probably join in with mocking all this excess. Why else did he think she had him here?

Mrs. Evans caught her unawares with her hiss of, "Lily."

"What?"

"After Petunia dances with your father, you are to dance with him."

Sulkily, Lily answered, "Alright."

"And stop keeping Severus in the corner with you. Come on, Severus. I'll find you someone to dance with after you take me for a spin."

"Mum, leave him alone."

"I don't mind dancing with your mother, Lily," Severus commented, knowing he was on dangerous ground. Later, Lily would forget that she was in a bad mood, and review his actions through different eyes. Insulting her mother or Petunia, even if it was to agree with Lily, would have consequences.

"Fine, you two dance, and I'll dance with dad."

"You better adjust your tone, Lily," her mother advised.

Lily made a face before turning and walking away from them.

"Come on, Severus," Mrs. Evans repeated.

Severus cooperated and joined Mrs. Evans on the dance floor. She talked about the wedding, and Severus agreeably nodded. He thought he was doing alright till he saw Lily making a face at him. What did she want from him? If she wanted him to dance better, she could practice with him, rather than expect him to know it on his own. It was not something he could learn from a book.

Watching Severus, Lily did not think he was that bad a dancer. He was better than some of the other clods who were either swaying in place, or were getting dangerous with all the drinking that was going on. She saw the staff lining up champagne bottles on the side. Still no cake, but the bar was still serving.

Since the next dance was Lily's with her father, Mrs. Evans introduced Severus to Vernon's sister, Marjorie. She was slightly taller than him, and was physically shaped much like her brother. Burly, but she had two inches of neck that was wrapped in pearls. There were two levels of trepidation within Severus. He did not want to hurt Mrs. Evans' feelings by saying 'no', and Marge, as she asked to be called, could physically hurt him. She drained a full glass of wine in one swallow indicated that she may not be sober. Severus was not sure if Vernon would assist, since he had not seen them together to gauge if her brother cared about her getting rejected by an ugly, pockmarked teen in need of a haircut.

Marge allowed Severus to keep a proper distance between their two bodies. She talked about dogs and led. Forcefully led. After their one song, she continued to lead Severus with a solid grip on his arm. She ordered another glass of wine at the bar.

Severus saw the large tiered white iced cake being wheeled in. Lily was right. It looked important. He did not know what the symbolic significance of the little dolls on top, representing Vernon and Petunia, meant. He did not want to converse with Marge. Besides it might be a muggle thing that everyone was expected to know.

After downing the new glass, Marge returned them to the dance floor until the cake cutting was announced. Severus allowed Marge to lead as she liked. He was not feeling especially well watching Lily dance with men, other than her father. She'd rather dance with them than him. Lily was smiling. Maybe she preferred to dance with anyone but him.

The dancing stopped for speech making, cake cutting, champagne and eating cake and other desserts. Not that interested in eating more than the token half fork of cake, Severus followed the champagne with another ale before approaching Lily at the long table with the other wedding participants.

"How's it going for you, Sev? Isn't this great?" Lily asked, smiling at him, before finishing her champagne.

He nodded, unsure of what to say in response.

"The music should start up again soon."

"Then what happens?" he asked.

"People dance. My feet are killing me, so I'm done. I'm going to have to stay till the end because we got to arrange to get all that crap back to the house. Did you want to go?" Lily lowered her voice to a whisper, "I saw who mum fixed you up with to dance."

"It's not too early?"

"No, just uh, say good-bye to Petunia, Vernon and my parents and then you can go."

"Alright," he agreed, sensing that Lily was giving him the alternatives of leaving or continuing to dance with Marge. "What time should I come over tomorrow so we can go back to school?"

"Did you want to come over for brunch?"

"Can we leave after that?"

"But after that we could … you know."

"I have a lot of homework so I need the library," Severus huffed. If Lily could not be bothered to have one dance with him in public, why should he agree to sneak off with her? He knew he'd reconsider, but right now, he couldn't contemplate more than nothing he did was good enough for Lily, unless it involved sex.

"Can't you ask for an extension or something since it's been a while since … well, with Dumbledore, I know, but …?"

A little voice in his head was urging him to shag Lily till she couldn't walk. Take it while he could get it, and damn the consequences. Severus knew Lily was going to leave him, so why not enjoy it and leave her with the memory of what she'd never experience with someone else? "I'd rather not."

"Can't you get any of it done without the library?" Lily whined.

"I did finished that part already. For someone who claimed school was more important than anything else right now, I would expect you to have a little empathy for me."

"I do, but you spend so much time on your school work, Sev, and I really need it," she pleaded.

"I'm tired of hearing about what you need."

"What?" Lily gasped, shocked that Severus would say something like that to her. Obviously, he had had too much to drink.

"I have reached my limit for today, and I don't know about tomorrow or after that. I'll come by at noon, and I may return to Hogwarts without you, if you are not ready to go then."

"You _may_ return without me? Is that supposed to be a threat?"

"I am informing you of my intention in advance. If you choose to interpret that as a threat because I am making a decision for myself, that's your choice."

"Perhaps I will. Maybe I'll interpret as you are breaking up with me."

"Breaking up? Don't I have to be your boyfriend first?"

Boyfriend? Lily made a face, and argued, "No."

"Then why are you seeing anything as a threat? I've had a long day, not as long as yours, I admit. I attended the wedding of your sister as an invited guest because I've known her for years. You turned me down when I asked you for a dance because you were not obliged to treat me any differently than any other guest, because as you said I am not your boyfriend, or whatever you are not calling us. After meeting my commitment here, I would like to return to school to resume my normal schedule, but you are asking me to delay that because tomorrow I am worth more than the rubbish I am today?"

"Rubbish? I never … and when did you ask me to dance?"

"Earlier, on the other side of the room, before your mother danced with me."

"You asked me to dance with _you_?" Lily asked in confusion.

"There's no need to continue insulting me. I'll see you tomorrow," Severus said, turning away to make his way down the table, while all the people he was supposed to say farewell to were gathered together. Others appeared to be taking their leave now, so it seemed appropriate.

"Wait," Lily called, grabbing at his arm.

"What?"

"If you stay, I'll dance with you."

"You already said your feet hurt, and I've made up my mind to leave."

"But Sev … I … I guess I'll talk to you tomorrow. But you have this all wrong."

"I don't think so."

Lily got up and trailed behind Severus. He didn't say anything unusual to anyone. Vernon acted a little odd by holding up his wedding band to show it off and winked at Severus. Was it some inside joke from the bachelor party last night? Maybe, because her father then patted Sev's shoulder.

Petunia mildly bid Severus, "So long, freak."

Lily sat down next to Petunia, observing others wish the couple luck and a safe trip. What was she going to do between now and noon tomorrow? Sev would probably realize what a fool he was when he sobered up. At least that was what Lily was thinking till her mother asked, "Why didn't you dance with Severus earlier?"

"I don't have to, if I don't want to."

"Lily, not everything is about what you want. Severus helped out Vernon and your father last night. At least he had the right spirit about this."

"What?"

"Vernon had an accident, and uh, Severus was able to sort it when your father specifically asked him to so … I know he shouldn't have, but it would have put a damper on today, if he hadn't."

"Mum, did Vernon see?"

"Since he was bleeding, yes."

"Oh, well, that's um, alright I guess. Sev wasn't the reason why Vernon was hurt?"

"No, it was just boy stuff that got out of hand and a glass end table," Mrs. Evans said with a shake of her head and lifted her eyes. Thank goodness, she did not have sons.

"Well, that has nothing to do with me dancing with Severus. Petunia should have danced with him than."

"What?" Petunia asked, hearing her name.

"I said," Lily repeated, "you should have danced with Severus."

Petunia's lip curled, before she moderated herself and commented, "He was dressed appropriately. You know maybe Marge can straighten him out. The way she trains her dogs is amazing. Probably feed him up a bit too."

"He's not a dog," Lily sniped.

"Girls," Mrs. Evans murmured. "I only mentioned it was a shame that Severus went through the trouble to come, and Lily did not have time to dance with him."

"Bad enough he was seen here, and we were serving food so it's not a total loss for him," Petunia sniffed.

"He gets fed at school."

Petunia's eyes drifted over her sister and she observed, "Obviously pretty well."

"It's all the studying," Lily retorted. "I have a job this summer so maybe I'll get some exercise, and fresh air too."

"Wasn't it … mixing things?" her mother asked.

"He asked about our um, botany grades so it could be outside with plants too."

"Good thing you got a job," Petunia hissed. "I can't believe you'd borrow money from Snape. And so much. He could probably feed himself for a year on that."

"Why did you tell her?" Lily indignantly inquired.

"Lily, I changed the guest list for Petunia's wedding. It was only right that I consult Petunia."

"You and dad are paying for it," Lily reminded them.

"Because it's our pleasure to do that for our daughter. I don't know what we're going to do with you, Lily."

"Perfect Lily takes everything for granted and wants it served on a silver platter," Petunia said with a smirk.

"I do not."

"You two stop it, before your father hears. Or Vernon."

"It's too late for him now," Lily laughed. "He's stuck with her."

"That's not funny."

Petunia added, "You are simply jealous. Have been for months. Trying to dictate to us in your letters from your freak school about gowns, hair, flowers … it's my wedding. When you land one of those food-throwing, bollock scratching slobs that you go to school with, then you can pick what will get hurled besides the bouquet."

"Ugh, I'd never marry one of them, Tunie. They're horrible."

"If Snape's the best of them, they must be."

"Why are you picking on Severus?"

"Who said I was? I simply find it as strange as mum does that you refused to dance with him." Petunia was trying to trip up Lily. Old habits died hard, and at the moment, Severus could do little wrong in her mother's eyes. Becoming suddenly orphaned, even at seventeen, tended to do that.

"I didn't refuse."

Petunia tilted her head and explained, "Well if you didn't refuse, it's only because he was too shy to ask. I'm sure he had hopes."

"You don't know anything about it."

"Girls, please."

"Ready, my Petunia?" asked a solicitous Vernon, giving Petunia a kiss on the cheek she offered him.

"Of course. Now that my sweet, perfect sister is giving me yet another reason to be swept off my feet by you, and come live in your castle, my dear dream prince."

"I am not."

"By the way, if your friend can sort wounds, what can you do?"

"Huh?"

"He said you did something different."

"She plays with toads and frogspawn. It's disgusting," Petunia said with her nose crinkled. "Like her smelly owl."

"I can do a lot of things. Not just … I guess you'll have to wait till I can properly show you, Vernon. I'm looking forward to proving that it's more than toads."

"Yeah, she's a whiz with teacups too," Petunia giggled. "Let's go before she throws a fit."

"I do not throw fits."

"Lily, what are you carrying on about?" Mr. Evans asked.

"I am not carrying on."

"She is," Mrs. Evans disagreed. "We'll talk about it at home."

"God!"

"How many glasses of wine did you have, young lady, to be mouthing off like that?" her father demanded.

"Little wonder Severus left so early with her being so argumentative," Mrs. Evans complained.

"Me? It was him."

"You said you did not feel like dancing with him."

"Why not?" Mr. Evans asked. "He looked fine out there, even with Miss Dursley. A little mismatched, but alright."

"Why do I need to give a reason? Maybe I didn't feel like it."

"Can the attitude, Lily. I need to get some things sorted first, then I can take you home."

"Good."

Mrs. Evans asked, "Do you want a bar of soap in that mouth?"

"What?"

"Just keep talking."

"You can't do that."

"I can try. And if not, maybe a squirt of dish detergent while you're sleeping."

"Ugh, that's child cruelty."

"If only they set up a hotline for parent cruelty. You, your lip and your airs."

Lily snarled, stood and put her hands on her hips. She'd walk out if she had somewhere she could go. Spinner's End was too far a walk from here, her wand was at home because she didn't want to put it in her knickers or the waistband of her panty hose, and Sev might not even answer the door.

Mr. Evans returned to his family after he finished finalizing some bills, getting information on one refund he was due, and verified the date the photographs would be ready for review.

"What now?" he asked.

"Lily's got her mouth in a pucker thinking about me squirting dish detergent in it," her mother replied.

"I do not."

**************************************

Severus was such a dunderhead. He knew better. How many times was it proven that it was ridiculous for him to hope for anything? Might as well be lurking behind bushes watching Lily and Petunia on the swings again.

Lily was angry with him. It couldn't be avoided. There was limit to how much he should be expected to tolerate. She intentionally made him miserable today. He meant so little to her. Why? Lily agreed to spend more time with him this summer. He was sure he expressed himself properly that it was to bring them closer together. He could adjust to what Lily wanted, but if she behaved as she did today, it would jeopardize both their future apprenticeships if she could not act professionally around others.

Lily may blame him for that, but at some point she had to give up being a Gryffindor and take responsibility for herself and what she did.

He could replay the day in his head, feeling wretched while losing a night's sleep, or lose a night's sleep while being constructive and erasing his unhappiness at the same time. Baring the floor, he lay down lines of salt to form a pentagram. There was a variation of a Dark Arts conjuration that he wanted to try out while away from the prying eyes at Hogwarts.

**************************************

Although it rubbed her the wrong way, Lily was packed, in case she decided to return to Hogwarts with Severus at noon. It depended on how he apologized for yesterday. He should have made himself clearer. Though if her parents did not shut up, she'd want to leave as soon as possible. At times, very rare times, Lily wished she had parents more like Severus'. They never cared what he did. He moped about all the time, and Lily bet he never got threatened with soap or dish washing liquid.

Today, things were much clearer to Severus. After successfully experimenting through the night and most of the morning, his doubts were erased. Lily Evans could do as she liked. He was not a child anymore, he knew that he never meant anything to her. Severus knew that for years, and it was about time he faced it. So what if she did not delight in shagging anyone else for the rest of her life? That was her own fault for this past year of toying with him. Lily knew what hurt him and had no qualms about twisting that knife in his gut. Now it was his turn, but he'd be subtle about it. That way Lily would have no idea what was going wrong with her torture of him. Maybe he'd be so good at it, he could get it to last till graduation to get his year back.

Severus arrived promptly at noon. Lily took one look at him as she opened the back door and said, "You don't look well, Sev."

"I did not sleep."

Her initial resolve deflated. Severus had been deeply troubled by yesterday. Maybe her family was right. He had hoped to dance with her. "Would you like to get some rest before going back to school?"

"No, I'd rather get going."

There was an odd glint in Severus' eyes. Did he take some kind of potion?

"Cup of tea, Severus, or something to eat?" Mrs. Evans asked. She was aware he had argued with Lily yesterday, then probably returned home to that empty house. Now he looked bedraggled, after he looked so fine yesterday.

"No thank you, Mrs. Evans."

"Did you eat anything today, Sev?" Lily asked.

"I am not hungry, Lily. Are you ready to go or not?"

Lily's mouth twisted. That wasn't a nice way to ask, but Sev needed her, or he might keel over while walking up to the school. "I'm packed. Let me just go get my stuff." She had hinted with the way she turned that Sev could follow her upstairs, but she felt he was so tired, he was oblivious and stood at the kitchen door waiting for her.

She said good-bye to her father and mother on her way out, and mentioned to Severus, "You might be too tired to get your homework done."

"I don't feel tired."

They went behind the garden shed, and Phi landed on Severus' left shoulder. "I want to try apparating somewhere else."

"Where?"

"To a different floo point, but if I can get that far, it'll save us time over the summer," Severus said while grabbing Lily's arm.

"But if it's that far …" Lily was jerked into the apparition as Severus took her through side-along, rather than telling her their destination.

Severus hid his smugness as they arrived in Mould-on-the-Wold. He knew he was powerful, but showing off to gain enemies wasn't in him. Impressing Lily, when she kept saying every wizard out there was preferable to him was different.

"Where's this?" she asked, checking for splinching. Even Phi was alright.

"Mould-on-the-Wold."

"But that's outside of safe apparating distance from my house."

"I must have enough Determination," he shrugged in response. "It'll save us time, won't it?"

"I'm not sure if I can."

"Don't you trust me to side-along? We are working the same days."

"Yeah, but how do you do this stuff, Sev? And you know all your nonverbal spells annoy me."

"Which spell do you want to know?"

"Like when you caught Dumbledore. That was brilliant."

"I cast them nonverbally so whoever didn't overhear and counter them."

"Who knows enough counters to combat you, Sev? You've been reading up on spells before we even got on the train the first time."

"The headmaster might," Severus replied sarcastically. "There's always new spells. I keep telling you that. Do you think He Who Must Not Be Named found the Dark Mark in a book, and thought to himself that he wanted to copy another dark wizard?"

"Of course not."

"When dueling or simply fighting, it's best not to let your opponent know what you plan to do."

"Like when you ambushed the Marauders?"

"Standing in the middle of a hall and challenging the four of them with fair warning would not have been wise. Besides, I was not using spells that would permanently injure them. They all were on very good terms with Pomfrey. That's why she turned a blind eye to all the younger students they injured. She'd heal them, but there wasn't anything ever done about the cause of it, except for her to complain she was overworked."

This was no Hogsmeade. Just a dirt road with some buildings. She could see some houses in the distance. They were spaced out. Lily frowned as they entered the local inn. She still hadn't come up with anything to sort Pomfrey. She was like Dumbledore. Considered above reproach because most of the time she helped people. Slughorn might be getting himself in his own trouble with wooing the recently widowed Mrs. Black, unless he was secretly protecting Regulus from Sirius. Lily preferred to think that his greed was getting the better of him.

"May we use your floo, sir?" Severus asked the only person in the taproom. A man in an apron, behind the bar who was reading Witch Weekly.

"It was installed as a courtesy for paying customers," the man replied, lowering his magazine.

Severus asked Lily, "Did you want some mead?"

"He can't ..."

"It's his floo, his rules."

"I am so god damned sick of rules."

"Well, we'll know for next time. For our summer work, we won't need to floo, unless we want to head down to London."

"That'd be nice. Um, yeah, get a mead from the toerag."

Severus walked over and ordered Lily's mead and an ale for himself, while Lily seated herself heavily at a table. He was only charged two sickles. Either this was going to be fouler than Polyjuice, or this man was not interested in making money, in spite of limiting access to his floo.

He took a sip of his ale. It was watery in both taste and the lack of bubbles. Severus preferred it without a great deal of foam, but this was flat. It wasn't bad enough to spit out, and there was enough light in here to confirm there was no foreign objects in either glass.

Lily momentarily was annoyed that her mead was in a full-sized drinking glass, the same as Sev's drink, but it was not bad. Tasty. There was something to it. Not just the sweetness of the honey mead, but some sort of fruit. Since Sev was taking his time with his ale, Lily got a second glass.

Severus observed Lily getting smashed and randier by the moment. She kept touching his hands and arms. A third glass would have her on his lap, and probably passed out before they got back to school.

His ideas from this morning need refining. They had seemed brilliant then, but Severus knew the Dark Arts tended to give someone feelings of invincibility and self-confidence bordering on recklessness. He should have known he was in the thrall of that earlier today. Some of his best ideas were irrevocably damaging, like shoving warmed suet up Lily's arse and fucking that hole while she cried and screamed. Severus would like Lily to stay his friend for a long time, so she could beg him to shag her when her husband couldn't please her.

Lily smiled back at him with a crooked grin. She was lying, deceitful, cruel and an unsuspecting idiot, even when sober. He took out a reused tin that he put some floo powder in, and said, "How about we get on our way?"

**************************************

AN: silk douppioni


	41. Chapter 41 Price of Forgiveness

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 41 Cost of Forgiveness

Severus frowned at his mail. Lupin wanted absolution, and generously offered one hundred galleons for him to sign this document. Even if he had no gold, a hundred galleons? Is that all his life was worth? Lupin's family undoubtedly spent time agonizing over their son in Azkaban to scrape together this offer.

There was condition upon condition on this paper. Damned solicitors. All six parties had to agree, or none would get paid. Severus felt that Parkin's family might never sign. Sirius Black was not relevant to this deal. Someone must have figured that Black was long gone, and not coming back to throw himself on the mercy of the Wizengamot and confess that Lupin knew nothing of his plan. Ah friendship …

Hopefully, Lily was offered more than one hundred since she had suffered an actual injury and cursed wounds that changed her. What about MacDonald? She needed definitely needed more than a hundred. Severus did not pay attention to her often, but she whinged on about her lycanthropy something awful.

Severus quickly found out that Lily was offered five thousand, and MacDonald ten thousand. They were both forthcoming with their offers.

"Is 10,000 enough?" Severus asked.

"I wouldn't have it otherwise," Mary replied. "I get nothing if he stays in Azkaban."

"5,000 is a lot to me," Lily said. "I wouldn't have to work this summer."

"I thought the primary reason to take the position was to line up an apprenticeship because fifty galleons is meaningless to you, Lily."

"It's not meaningless," Lily snapped. "It's just I'd rather not work, if I had all this money."

"The alternative is I ask to go back to the original offer, and stay there myself for six weeks straight."

"Why? You would get a hundred galleons for doing nothing."

"First off, it's not nothing. Secondly, I do need an apprenticeship. And in case you did not realize it, I already accepted the job."

"So? Tell him you changed your mind."

Mary butted in, "There is a matter of personal integrity here. I think Severus is right."

"Who asked you?" snipped Lily.

"I will work, whether you join me or not. Besides, it's premature to count any money until we know what Rosier, Wilkes and Parkin's family intend to do. Perhaps the five of us should write to the Parkins, as a group."

"To ask them to sign?"

"Not necessarily."

Lily sighed, "Are you getting all Slytherin?"

"I think a degree of caution is wise, along with a better understanding of the bigger picture. For instance, as far as we know, Lupin's family … do they have the money to actually pay this? Maybe they have an idea to pay it over time. Between us, it's over 15,000 galleons. What if they think Remus Lupin will pay it to us and our families over the course of his working career?"

"No one hires werewolves," Mary complained.

"There is no time limit set on how soon we need to sign these. Realistically, we could comfortably wait another year till we graduate."

"Can you talk to Malcolm and Evan?" Mary asked.

"I could inquire if they would like to jointly discuss this," Severus replied. "I don't believe I feel the same way you two do about this money, so I'd rather not represent your interests."

"Do they teach that kind of talk to Slytherins first year, Sev?" Lily inquired.

"The point is moot if Parkin's family does not sign. I think Rosier has the best case to make for or against convincing them. MacDonald ..."

"Will you call me Mary?"

" … Mary then, has a convincing argument as well. With Lupin left in Azkaban, she receives nothing, and she has a poor outlook for future employment."

"I'd like Lupin and Black in Azkaban, and the money too," Mary stated, "but I have to be practical. Black will never be caught, and he was the one who planned it. I also don't know what will happen years from now, when my parents are gone and I'm left on my own. Maybe 10,000 is not enough, and if it's paid over a hundred years or so, it definitely won't be anything worth … signing for."

Lily made a face, and sighed, "I don't know. I don't think Remus Lupin is necessarily evil, but he definitely knew that Black could use him like that. Their stupid live for the moment crap."

Severus bit his lower lip to stop words from flying out of his mouth. Wasn't Lily going to live large on five thousand galleons for the rest of her life? That was the same live for the moment attitude. He was not jealous over the money. She was welcome to it, but her attitude that perhaps she was not willing to work towards her goals … would she prefer to be like Potter, Black, Mulciber and all the rest who had money and did nothing with themselves except be a burden to others simply because they expected everyone to cater to them? Maybe it was for the best that Severus did not consider all that money his to do whatever he liked. Lily would have spent it by the wheelbarrow. What was wrong with her? One day Lily talked about her goals and all the good she was going to do, the next, she waved them off.

He left them to work on Divination review, and to chat about what they were going to do with money that may never be theirs. Severus was tired from his own review and finalizing a project of his own that he did not have the patience left to listen to such drivel. Besides, with Divination couldn't they foresee what would come of this?

Severus decided to put this solicitor of his to work to ferret out what this deal meant. The man suspected he had money, probably because he willed a number of vault numbers individually before leaving the rest to Lily. At this point, he had Lily or her parents, Argus Filch, Atlas Abstractus and Socrates Upsilon. If he wanted to give it some soul-searching thought, it was depressing. However, he knew the three staff members were not nice to him for any ulterior motive. He was of no consequence.

The solicitor claimed he could perform other services and had employees or colleagues that did investigative work. It had crossed Severus' mind that he could check up on Black, but Regulus said his brother was intentionally married to a half-veela so they'd never have to hear from him again. Word in Slytherin house was that Black did not leave the woman's side wherever they went, which was pretty much all over wizarding Europe. Was it a relief not to have to think or make decisions? Lily certainly felt she was qualified to decide for herself, him and everyone she just met.

He did not know what to do about Lily. If she worked with him this summer, and lived with him, Severus was sure that he would be closer to a decision. He was afraid of spurning her irrevocably. The loss of his mother was different, but what if it became a similar obsession? He thought of his mother frequently. Sometimes his father, but mostly his mother. There was nothing he could do, nor any decisions he could have made differently since information was intentionally withheld from him.

Lily would be different. If he made the wrong decision, it would be his own fault.

***************************

The girls were still talking about the possibility of thousands of galleons the next morning at breakfast, since they had to break to study for today's Divination final, over their sausage and bacon with some eggs and hash browned potatoes with a splash of gravy.

Lily was contemplating a Belgian waffle with jam, butter and syrup when the mail arrived. Upon receiving mail from home in addition to the newspaper, she decided to slather one up to enjoy while she read the note from her mother. Petunia should be back from her honeymoon, and moved her bum and junk out of the house to clutter up wherever with Vernon … Little Wigging or something, south in Surrey. Who'd want to live in Surrey anyway?

Once her waffle was cut up so Lily could read without interruption, she opened the envelope. There was a letter from mum, and a smaller, thick, ecru envelope with her sister's cursive on it addressed to 'Severus Snape'. What the heck were they bothering her with now?

The sneer on her face grew because for some unknown reason Severus had left a gift for Petunia at the wedding. Freaking pressure cooker that she wanted, but probably never use. Her whole gift list was filled with that sort of garbage. Lily's mother was in a bit of a dither about him spending more money than he should have … well, if he didn't have it, he wouldn't have been able to buy that silly pot, would he? When were people going to realize that Severus did as he darned well pleased? If he did not want to give Petunia anything, Lily would not have been surprised if he left her nothing. Anyway, her mother thought Lily had something to do with it. Why? Lily's gift of a soup tureen, gravy boat and some stupid covered butter dish and probably some other crap were picked out by mum and paid for by dad. She didn't need Severus to do anything, and why would they think that anyway since Severus was only her friend … not anything else, as far as they knew. Well, best friend who saved her life, but if the tables were turned Lily could have saved Severus. After all, she was the Gryffindor, not him.

At least this time there were no cranberry bars, or she'd whack Sev in the head with the tupperware when she got to Potions. Nonetheless, she hit his bicep with the envelope when she joined him on the stairs.

"Yeah?" he asked.

"Mail for you from Tunie."

"Oh," he said and took it. He started to laugh, but then stopped. "It's still sticky. So I guess Petunia sent it out nice and clean?"

"It's just a little jam."

"And greasy butter."

Lily tutted. She doubted he was going to save the envelope. Sev could always charm it clean, if he wanted.

Initially, he had thought that Petunia had soiled the envelope to show her displeasure, but it was Lily again. It was not important, but it was just one more little vexation.

"Well, what she'd write?"

"If you insist," he said with a sigh and opened the envelope. The butter had soaked through to the stiff paper folded over into a note that had 'Thank You' printed on the front. What Petunia had written inside was brief and expressed some gratitude for his gift. He handed it to Lily.

"Hmm, she could have been a little more thankful. My parents said you didn't have to give her a gift."

"I'm satisfied with it."

Lily huffed and folded the note back up. She held out her hand for the envelope, and Severus gave it to her. "You should be treated better."

Severus quirked an eyebrow at her. Petunia treat him better? Lily would say anything to start some friction. Petunia was Petunia, and he was used to her. Staying out of her way was the best method of dealing with her, and if he was in her path, be nice and polite. That ticked her off, but Tunie couldn't do anything about that. She had not struck or kicked him for years since age no longer made her bigger and stronger. Besides, she never hit him hard. Now that she was moving far away, it was not the time to escalate hostilities with Lily's sister.

For now though, there was Wilkes and Rosier, along with the small matter of their Potions practical brewing final. When his roommates said they weren't interested in signing anything for Lupin, Severus had suggested they jointly negotiate and give the amount to MacDonald. They were interested in that solution. There were two problems – Lily Evans and the Parkins. Neither knew yet. Sev could warn Lily, but she was more likely to argue with him without intellection. Maybe if the three of them suggested it together, Lily might consider it first without letting her mouth do her thinking for her.

Slughorn assigned them places alphabetically and then each of them flipped over their parchment to see what potion they were to brew from memory. Severus sneered. Wit-sharpening was a fourth year potion. Simple. From the looks around him, others may have been assigned non-NEWT level potions. There were too many Ravenclaws in this class.

While he waited for his turn to go to the supply cabinet for the scarab beetles, ginger roots and armadillo bile, Severus set up his cauldron and other instruments. He would not create, measure or warm the water till he returned. He did not think there was anyone left in the class that would mess with his ingredients, but testing his theory on the final would be reckless.

Severus saw Lily with puffer fish eyes. Swelling Solution? He hoped so because they weren't used for much else and that was the only potion he knew of taught at Hogwarts that used them. However, why would Slughorn assign a second year potion for a NEWT final? Lazy sod.

No one in the class was displeased with their potion results. Although some had a longer simmering time, all were completed well within the alloted period. The bad mood of the Ravenclaws at not truly being tested was infectious though, and not just Severus' dislike about anything Slughorn did or did not do.

The grading was quick and simple. Slug Club members got an O, and everyone else received an E, including Lily. Severus was not sure if she noticed the criteria. It really did not matter, as long as they were given passing marks.

Lily noticed that Evan Rosier stopped next her in the hall while she waited for Severus. Evan and Malcolm had been quiet since November, but sometimes would nod at her in the halls. Did Sev already talk to him? 'S' was right after 'R' so Lily did not have time to complete thinking of what to say when Severus came out.

"Well?" she asked.

"E."

"Me too."

"Hmm. Wilkes should be out soon, if you have time now, Evans."

Lily tried to discern why Severus had reverted to using her last name. Surely Rosier and Wilkes still knew they were together. "Yes, I have time ... Snape."

Wilkes was the last out of the Potions classroom. He rolled his eyes and said, "This class is not going to prepare us for our NEWTs next year. Maybe Flitwick and the Ravenclaws will light a fire under someone's arse."

Rosier answered, "I doubt it. What about all our lackluster Defense teachers?"

They all muttered their agreement. This year's had not been terrible so of course, he went for a row on the lake, fell overboard and drowned somehow. They took last year's sixth year final exam which was a disastrous year because it was taught by a ninny. Totally different curriculum, but why would that matter?

"So shall we go outside?" Evan Rosier asked.

"Might as well," Wilkes replied, "if it's alright with you two."

"Fine," Lily answered. She was slightly worried because it was her and three Slytherins. No Mary. Severus would not let them talk circles around her, would he? If they married, Lily's remaining windfall would be theirs to share.

Severus shrugged his shoulders. The walk outside to find a nice, quiet spot might be longer than the actual conversation.

They didn't need to go far because there were a lot of empty benches in the courtyard. Severus nonverbally cast _muffliato_ so if Lily got loud, no one else would know what they were discussing. He also remained standing in front of the bench so he could see the others' faces.

"Did you tell her?" asked Rosier.

"I didn't get a chance. Lily, we are not interested in signing the documents to forgive Lupin for personal monetary gain."

"More like he's not forgiven," Rosier added as an explanation.

"But … I know a hundred galleons isn't a lot, but we don't know how much he's offered the Parkins. Maybe they are getting most of it."

"A hundred?" Malcolm repeated.

"That was my offer," Severus admitted, since Lily was so free with information. "Rosier and Wilkes were offered a thousand each."

"What?" Lily inquired in confusion.

"Perhaps the feeling was we would not discuss it," he replied with a shrug.

"That's not right." Why did Lupin still have to be a toerag? Bad enough Black wanted Severus dead, but Lupin can't offer the same amount to each of the boys? Lily was tempted not to sign purely on principle.

"So that's where us three stand. We would prefer the four of us unite and request a larger amount for MacDonald, and clarify the whole amount needs to be paid, without the Parkins and not over a period of time."

Lily stared at Severus. The four of us? "What about me?"

Severus paused before answering, "Although you were hurt, MacDonald's life was irrevocably changed. Did you want some time to think about it? We're trying to figure out how Lupin even has any gold to offer so that will take time."

"Maybe Black or Potter?" Lily suggested.

Wilkes said, "Maybe Potter. Black's supposedly locked out of his family vault except for a monthly allowance his mum sends him."

"From what we hear, he spends it all on his wife," Rosier muttered. "Black better hope his mummy remembers how much children cost. He's a complete idiot."

"Rumors. Anyway, there's a couple solicitors between us checking into it so we can request an appropriate amount for MacDonald," Severus commented. Regulus couldn't wait to cut off his brother's allowance. It would only sweeten it more for the younger brother if his older brother did not think to save a single knut. Severus might have to stay friendly with Regulus just to stay informed on how it turned out.

"I think I'll take up your offer to think about it then," Lily said thoughtfully. Why would Severus allow her to get no money? What was his real plan?

It wasn't until later in the day that Lily was able to ask Severus, once they were alone.

"Sev, what are you up to with negotiating only for Mary?"

"What do you mean?"

"What about my five thousand?"

"Is that more important to you?"

"I don't know. What if Lupin can't pay any of it?"

"It would have been rude of him to offer, if he couldn't."

"So you and I would get nothing?"

"Not with the current plan. Did you need the money for something specific, Lily, or just the comfort of having money in the bank?"

"Does it matter?"

"Yes. Is it a secret?"

"From you?"

"You can keep secrets from me, Lily."

"Oh come on. Aren't you afraid I'm planning some silly Gryffindor thing?"

"Those are usually free. Did you want a broom?"

"Oh ha ha. A broom."

"It's alright to want money. If you need money for something, but don't want to tell me what, you can tell me the amount. How's that?"

"I don't need any money specifically right now, Sev."

"Alright. That's fine. Anyway, if I think we phrase this altruistically, we can ask for more than was offered to the five of us, and it should not be dependent on the Parkins. Out of us, MacDonald is the one that has the most pressing future need. Rosier and Wilkes have money, and you and I can earn it ourselves."

"But … this is so un-Slytherin, isn't it?"

"What do you mean? It's a counteroffer."

"But what do you get out of it?"

"A hundred galleons? Now that you went blabbing that that was all I was offered … hm, normally I would say a hundred galleons is something, but in this case, it is not worth it. I'd rather Lupin stay in Azkaban than settle for a hundred. That's probably why Rosier and Wilkes were offered more. They easily could have a hundred as pocket money. They would be insulted by such a low offer."

"Well, I'm insulted for you then."

"It was the offer to MacDonald that had me willing to sign. When Rosier and Wilkes said they were not going to sign, I mentioned that MacDonald needed money, even if they did not."

"They still like her?"

"Yes. What made you think they didn't?"

"They don't talk to us anymore."

"Don't worry about that too much. Appearances are important."

"No, they're not."

"Not to us. For them, it is."

"It's so stupid."

"Anyway, are you trying to say you are not interested unless you receive something?"

"No, I wouldn't do that to Mary."

"Alright. It might take a while for us to come up with an appropriate figure, and I think they are also going to contact the Parkins to let them know. We don't want to go behind Parkin's family's back, if they are firmly against it without any explanation."

"That would be good."

"It would not be favorable to have each of us only looking out for our own interests. I'm not sure if that is why the term was written. To turn us against anyone who would not sign? The least likely to sign would be the Parkins. However, how could we blame them for not accepting whatever they were offered?"

"I doubt Lupin would think that way."

"Lupin and his family did nothing when he was first sent to Azkaban. Something's changed since then."

"So that's what you Slytherins are going to try to find out?"

"Yes, that way we can plan appropriately. If it's Black, maybe he'd find it easier to kill the five of us, rather than paying."

"How's that going to help? That would look suspicious, wouldn't it?"

"Wouldn't that be a minor detail to Black?"

"I suppose," Lily muttered. How she hated Sirius Black. Money. Sounded like Black, and that he'd offer Severus less than them. Sev picked up Helen's body, and inconveniently survived Black's stupid plan to kill him, using one of Black's own supposed best friends. He also saved Mary's and Lily's lives. And now Lily was worried about money, like a jerk.

***************************

After some lengthy consideration of how wrong this could go, Severus decided to attempt the spell with his mother's wand while at Hogwarts. It wasn't Dark Arts, just unorthodox to infuse a wand into a wizard's body. After years of being disarmed, who wouldn't want a wand that could not be removed? It was simply practical to Severus.

The spell hurt as the wand dissolved into his left hand. The pain would be worth it if the spell was successful. He concentrated on the spell's success. This wand was compatible with him.

When the pain subsided enough that he could breathe and close his mouth, Severus studied the darkness impregnating his left hand from the almost black wood. His finger nails were darker on his middle three fingers, and the knuckles were shadowed. Since he had poor skin coloring to start with, it was doubtful anyone would notice. Most people hardly looked at him because he was so ugly.

His first attempt at casting failed, but that was expected. MacDonald still was challenged by simple spells. For now, he was rather tired from the draining incantation. He could practice over the summer.

***************************

Lily was conflicted for the remainder of her finals. Severus along with Malcolm and Evan sounded so much like they wanted to do the right thing. There was Lily's personal misgiving over giving up any money for herself, and the nagging feeling that Slytherins never did anything for other people. Well, maybe that wasn't quite true. If she asked Severus for something, he'd probably do it for her, if it wasn't totally unreasonable. Though with Severus, he thought a lot of things were unreasonable … thanks to freaking Albus Dumbledore getting caught spying on them! As soon as they were home, after Lily said hello to her parents, she was going to shag him so much, Sev wouldn't be able to get out of bed.

For now, Lily kept the boys' plan secret from Mary. Mary did ask Severus about the other Slytherins in front of Lily, and he responded that they were thinking it over. They needed time to think through the possible outcomes.

Lily did slip on the Hogwarts Express on their way to King's Cross that Malcolm and Evan were offered a thousand galleons, instead of Sev's one hundred. It was an honest mistake, but Severus glared darkly at her, while Mary expressed outrage over Lupin slighting Severus like that. Although Lily had been told that Potter's solicitor was representing Lupin for the appeal. The Slytherins upped their request to an even half million galleons for Mary. Unbelievable. They were completely mad.

She sighed and excused herself to do prefect duties. Lily and Severus had planned on a nice afternoon in Diagon Alley to look for a wedding present for Frank and Alice. That's what they were supposed to be discussing with Mary. Severus had said he could pay for whatever it was as long as it was not too expensive. She had already confirmed with her parents in advance, that her mum not meeting her at King's Cross. It was too long a train trip for her mum to take down to London alone anyway, now that her and Sev could get themselves home.

Severus was left alone with Mary MacDonald in the compartment. Lily's parting conversation put Mary's attention squarely on him, rather than on herself. Like Lily, MacDonald considered the world to revolve around her and her problems. It was tedious to listen to, but preferable over question about him.

"So besides you and Lily working for some potions geezer, what do you have planned for your summer, Severus?" Mary asked.

"Before that we're going to Longbottom's wedding, and maybe after we're done working, if we have all our assignments done, we might go somewhere for a week. Depends on what portkeys are open then."

"Like somewhere foreign?"

"Maybe not too exotic for our first trip. I only can get by in a couple languages, and Upsilon does not converse in modern Greek. Lily did not seem too interested in seeing the Parthenon anyway."

"I'd go to Greece with you."

Purposely Severus replied, "I'll mention it to Lily. Maybe that would change her mind, if the three of us could go together."

"Uh … so what else is there besides the Parthenon?"

"Well, Lily expressed an interest last summer in doing some sort of seaside holiday. There's beaches and boats there from what Upsilon said. That's why I thought we could go there since it would be something she'd like that also had some interest for me."

Mary frowned. Bathing suits. Not exactly something she could wear anymore. "That seems quite reasonable. The sun, sand and burnt skin aren't for me. I think I'd join you with the antiquities."

"There's a lot in the muggle British museums, and maybe other muggle museums. I'm not sure which."

"That would be a lot of fun," Mary said agreeably. "Even if it were just muggle artifacts."

Was MacDonald still fancying him? When Severus suggested they could go to a muggle museum or two in London, Lily said it would be boring. Wouldn't MacDonald feel the same way? She was still rubbish in Muggle Studies, even though her grade in that course was very respectable. She may be good for a laugh. MacDonald said whatever she thought, and there was not much real thinking going on in her head.

"With NEWTs, my assignments are going to have to come first."

"Hmm, yeah, you have what … seven courses?"

"Yes."

"And you're after a potions apprenticeship?"

"If it's reasonable. I don't want to sign up for ten or twenty years of indentured servitude."

"Some of those are ridiculous. From what I hear, when you start one of those, no matter what the field, there's a lot of busy work … like chopping ingredients all day, rather than actual teaching."

Severus shrugged, "If it's work that needs doing, that is what an apprentice is for. From what Regulus said, the apprentice at this place we'll be working has been there for years, so maybe us two doing the drudge work will free up her day."

"Well, you are pretty industrious, Severus, so I doubt someone would find enough work that needs doing that would prevent you from getting on with things."

"I doubt that. It's more likely I would become such a nuisance, a master would want to train me up to get me out of their house."

"You? You are not a nuisance. You may be a bit too smart, and aren't afraid to let others know they're not."

"When mediocrity is rewarded, and dunderheads are labeled as experts, it's hard to stay quiet."

"Like half our Defense instructors?"

"We're due for one that can't read or write."

Mary laughed.

Mary still looked happy when Lily returned a short while later in a huff, disgusted by some younger Gryffindor boys. What the hell was wrong with her house? Did their whole lives revolve around food, toilets and cruel pranks? Oh, and quidditch. Freaking quidditch. Only one more year.

Ignoring Lily's sour looks, Mary suggested, "Severus was telling me that the two of you might get some vacation travel in this summer. If you decide on a place and when, let me know. I could join you."

"Huh?" Lily asked. In her book, two's company and three was a crowd. If they went somewhere, it would be the two of them. Or maybe somewhere with her parents. That was still a possibility. "Well, we can't let our schoolwork suffer, so it's a big if. I lost points on my Divination, so I need to pay better attention this year. And Prof. Kettleburn is letting me rejoin Care of Magical Creatures with a lot of make-up work."

"You sure you want to take that?"

"I do. I only dropped it because of those toerags attacking students."

Mary frowned. That's right, Pettigrew or Black knocked Lily down and exposed her knickers on purpose in front of a crowd of fourth years. Just months after they were put on probation for ripping open girls' blouses. Sixth years and they were still doing that nonsense. Seventh year was going to be so much better without them. If only they hadn't left so many lasting gifts, like Mary's lycanthropy. Mary truly wanted to be the one that caught Sirius Black. She might even turn in what was left of him once she was done. Once Lupin was out of Azkaban, he'd be fair game too.

Severus was glad the two of them ran out of things to talk about in their lives and attempted to explain MacDonald's Muggle Studies assignment so she would not start off with bad information. He didn't want to talk about himself, the Marauders, Hogwarts or spend the rest of the trip speculating on their summer job.

Once the train arrived, and they bid MacDonald farewell, Lily and Severus apparated together to Diagon Alley.

"Lily, I have a question for you."

"What, Sev?"

"Are you able to keep secrets and resist asking questions?"

"Of course."

"Really? Well, here."

Lily took the key from Severus and asked, "Is this a vault key?"

"Yes, it's yours. Now you won't have to worry about not receiving any money from Lupin."

"What's in it?"

"Gold. You can look at it while I'm doing something in my vault."

"But … where did you get it?"

"Goblins. I asked them to open it for you. It's completely yours, unless you give the key back to me now."

"Why would I do that?"

"Because you cannot stop asking questions."

"But I want to be sure I'm not taking money from you, Sev."

"Potter's money is better?"

"No, but I know you have a little money, but you'll need it."

"Lily, I wouldn't have given it to you if I needed it. You expressed worry over not having money so I took care of it. It should be the five thousand you wanted."

"Where did you get that?"

"Either accept the gift, or give me the key back," Severus threatened. He knew Lily wouldn't simply take it, but right now, he had way too much money and Lily had been harping about Lupin's offer for over a week. It was his fault that he suggested that all their money go to MacDonald, so he was trying to make it up to Lily.

"Did something happen that you didn't tell me?"

"Why would I tell you anything? You can hardly stop yourself from telling it to everyone you meet."

"I do not."

"Then take this key. Do what you want with whatever's in the vault. Save it, spend it, or add to it. But tell no one I gave it to you."

"Did you steal it?"

"Not that I know of. It's complicated, but worth moving the money, in case someone realizes I got it by mistake. How's that for an explanation?"

"Not a very good one, Sev."

"Well, just consider it awindfall, and if you spend it, you now got a hint that it might be all there is. Alright?"

"Did you keep any for yourself?"

"Why, do you need more already?"

"No."

"Then let me do what I need downstairs, and you do whatever you want with that. I'll meet you back here."

Lily made a face at Severus, but he was already presenting his own key to a goblin clerk. Stupid Slytherins and their secrets. What if there really was five thousand in here? What if Sev did get it by mistake? Was she helping him hide it from the real owner? What if he was right that this was all there was? Well, it was five thousand she didn't have before. Or they didn't have before.

Lily got in line and presented this new key. Well, it wasn't a newly cut key, but it was new to her. The goblin examined the key, and then asked her to follow him. After a bumpy cart ride, they arrived at Lily's vault. There was a lot of galleons in here. It could be five thousand. Even though Severus said it was a gift … maybe he didn't mean it. It was a lot of money. In real money … it was usually five pounds to every galleon so this was twenty-five thousand pounds? Crap. Her parents wouldn't trust her with this kind of money. Was Severus crazy? Maybe he did steal it. Though thieves didn't just dump the money on their best friends, or did they? If she took the money, did that mean she was now expected to marry him?

Down at the Lestrange vault, or the main Snape vault, Severus chose some books and gave the goblin with him a goblin-wrought helmet. Why did they keep all this crap in here? Many of the priceless valuables were downright ugly. Some had some sort of aura about them, but a lot were probably worth more with the stones pried out and melted down to make something useful.

Some things were undoubtedly stolen. Like this stupid cup with the badgers. It was delusional, if a cup could be. The first time he had moved it, it tried to convince him that with its aid, he could become all-powerful. Yeah, that's exactly what Helga Hufflepuff was known for … seducing everyone she met with food was more like it. It was a cup after all, not a weapon. Not even original in its story, since obviously this mad cup never heard of the Holy Grail. The Grail was more of a test for a hero, not a ticket to power. Probably some dimwit stole it after believing its claim to make the possessor invincible. Maybe Sprout would know who this really belonged to, or their family since who knew how long it was locked up down here. Of course, he'd have to have a plausible story how he'd come across it, or he'd be stuck keeping it. He didn't want to do that. It would be more satisfying to dismantle the treasure trove that the Lestranges spent generations accumulating. He had also speculated about seeing what books they had in their house, and then maybe burn it down after taunting portraits of their apish ancestors.

His musing on his hollow revenge on the Lestranges was interrupted by Lily's thunderous expression when he returned to Gringotts upstairs. "What now?" he asked her.

She crossed her arms over her chest and replied, "I don't know, Sev. I can't stand not knowing."

"Why? What does it matter?"

"What?"

"It was my idea to make sure MacDonald got something fair. Potter's loaded. His family inherited the Peverell fortune. But what was important to you was what you got. Now that you have it, you still aren't happy. Just another reason why you think I'm not as good as other wizards."

"What are you carrying on about now?"

"Nothing. You keep telling me that you need to meet better wizards, because I'm not the right one for you, Lily. But I'm to consult you on everything I do because you think I'm incompetent."

A goblin hissed, "Your voice is carrying, Mr. Snape. Would you like to use one of our offices?"

"No, I'm leaving."

Lily noticed that goblins were staring at them. Surely people argued here all the time. Finances were stressful. And this wasn't even an argument. Severus was just being cranky. He told her when he first gave her the key to not ask any questions, and she did. It probably was some deal between the Slytherins, and Severus was supposed to get Lily to go along with it, now that she got her money. However, what Lily wanted to know is what they were getting out of helping Mary.

Crap, Severus really was leaving. Phi had already rejoined him, and he was going out the door. She ran, or almost ran, because she was not going to run after him, and when she caught up to him, asked, "What are doing? Leaving me in there like that."

"I thought you were done with your banking."

"What? I was, but we were talking."

"We were not having a conversation. You were pestering me when I asked you not to."

"I want to know where this money came from."

"I see no reason why I need to discuss my finances with you, Lily."

"Your finances?" Lily asked sarcastically. "Since when do you have finances, Severus Snape?"

"I don't. There's nothing to discuss except that I'm still willing to pay for this gift, since I was the one to whom the invitation was addressed. Alright? If it's not, I'll pick it without you."

"You can't pick out a gift, Sev."

"Why not?"

Lily fumed. Why was Severus being so argumentative today? Mary must have wound him up. Go on vacation with them. Really. Lily was a bit ticked at Mary herself. "Because it's supposed to be … you know."

He rolled his eyes at Lily, but did not reply. At least with her targeting his inability to choose a gift, she'd shut up about the money. Why did he bother doing anything for her? Nothing was good enough except nonstop sex.

Wizards should really get a simple, general store in Diagon Alley. Not books, pets, quidditch crap, potions ingredients, cauldrons, wands, ice cream, more books, fireworks or jokes. When Severus turned to go into a shop that had a table with a lantern upon it in the window, Lily hissed, "Not there."

"What?" he asked turning to look at the other choices nearby. "They might have something in here, or maybe we can go to a muggle store, and get something for their house?"

"Uh, I don't know about that."

"It doesn't hurt to look."

"Alright," Lily groused.

Severus liked the thief-proof strongbox. Password protected to not even be moved, even if the floor was cut away. Although it was recommended for ground floor or basements. Fire, acid and water proof too.

"It's stupid," Lily complained.

"We can put something in it so it's just not a box."

"Like what?"

"How would I know? You're the expert."

"No need to get sarcastic, Sev."

"We can visit other stores, but I like this. Would you be able to find something that'll fit in it? Or perhaps bigger that we can just put this on top of?"

"Don't pressure me."

"We don't have to get something to put in it today, Lily. We got a week for you to think it over."

"Just buy it already since your mind is made up."

"Did you want to go anywhere else? I don't want to carry this far."

"Oh … uh, did you want ice cream?"

Severus lifted an eyebrow, then said, "I can go with you if you'd like some."

"Uh, just a scoop. They have flavors I can't get at home."

"Alright, let me pay for this and then we'll pick it up last."

"OK, I'm going to get some owl treats. Do you need anything for Phi?"

"I'll meet you there. She's picky."

After the pet store, they sat together at Florean Fortescue's while Lily enjoyed her sundae. Severus studied her. Food and sex made Lily happy. It had to be the cursed wounds.

"What?" she asked.

"Hmm? I was thinking."

"About me?"

"What else?"

"I annoyed you earlier."

"Yes. You know I would not do something to intentionally harm you, Lily. No one is going to come after that money. It's yours."

"Why?"

"You continued to be upset over the werewolf thing, and wanted the five thousand. So now you have it."

"But it's not from Lupin."

"Lupin doesn't have it. Besides, Potter and Black both have loads of money so it would be nothing to them."

Lily sighed while trying to get the last of the fudge out of the bottom of her glass. "You are keeping a secret from me. I know it."

"So? I already asked you if you needed more money. Do you want presents? What is it you want?"

"Presents? Um, no … I mean, that's a lot of money, Sev."

"Yes, it is for us. But as I said, it's yours. You do whatever you want with it. I have enough for my current plans."

"We're still going to work?"

"I am. If you don't, I'm not going to force you."

"No, I'll come with you. I already said I would. If something's really wrong there, we can leave."

Severus looked serious as he commented, "Nothing trivial though. We have to be sensible. You still want to do the healing and help people, right?"

"Yeah."

"Alright. Sometimes you sound like you'd give it up, if you didn't need to work. I don't mean that I want you to work constantly, but giving up helping others when you could do that, would be wasteful. You know what I mean? Maybe if you do well, you can be selective about how hard you work, or specialize even."

"Well, I doubt I'll have that option for a while."

"Have you stayed in contact with Pye from St. Mungo's? You liked her, right?"

"Yes, I did like her, but why?"

"She's a healer. Maybe she'll know someone looking for an apprentice, or honestly tell you about someone that makes you an offer."

"Hmm. Maybe. Still will need NEWT scores."

"Do you need any books, or you're all set?"

"I'm fine for now."

"Did you want to look around the jewelry store?"

"For what?"

"Because I have no idea what you like. Your earrings are always small, and not glinting with precious stones, when you do wear them, which isn't often. Petunia wears rings, but you don't usually. Nor necklaces or bracelets. Your mother favors pearls, but do you?"

"I don't know. What's magical jewelry like?"

"Ostentatious and obnoxious."

Lily laughed, "That's exactly what I'm looking for."

"Maybe a tiara that sings 'God Save the Queen'?"

"Oh yes, I really need a tiara, but I need it to do different songs, depending on the occasion. Can they load it like a jukebox?"

"Ah, that way there could be a coin slot for sickles so we can recoup the investment."

"As long as I don't start dispensing drinks and snacks like a vending machine."

"Creating food out of nothing … that's a problem."

"Lucky me. So what do you really want to do in there?"

Severus shrugged, "If you ever say 'yes' to my proposal, you might easily change it to 'no', if I got the wrong type of ring. You didn't like Petunia's."

"It's a giant claw holding a rock. That's not stylish."

"Not everyone can share Petunia's taste. I believe it was simple to show off the diamond."

"Yeah, right. It's boring."

"So you'd prefer loud, obnoxious, blinking with a spotlight on it, ostentatious thing?"

"Maybe. Maybe I should look. I don't know if I want it shooting lights and did you say loud? As in it makes noise?"

"Some talk to draw attention, some recite poetry, and others sing."

"Huh? But wouldn't muggles notice?"

"Yes, they would. It might also wake you up."

"Ah jeez!"

"It wouldn't be so bad if we taught it one of your favorite songs, would it?"

"Knowing you, you'd remember every silly song I was fond of, Sev."

"If your ring and tiara could sing a duet, that would be spectacular."

"Let's go so I can say 'no' to everything that makes a peep. And all the claws. And don't go buying me anything because …"

"I know. I know. Besides, after six weeks of living together, we could come to our senses."

"We'll have weekends off."

"Thank goodness."

"Oh, already with the 'thank goodness'?"

"I'm not as lucky as your parents. They get rid of you for five days a week."

"Oh ha ha. Mum's probably bored to tears without Tunie."

"Maybe not yet. After the way you made all that wedding planning sound, maybe she's enjoying a bit of a vacation. You're about to barge in on her peace and quiet."

"I can spend time over at your house."

"Since when? Who's going to watch you?"

"I'm seventeen, Sev. Besides you can't take your eyes off me."

"I doubt your mother will take that as a recommendation."

"Neither would my father," Lily added. "So … ewe … why not stick some of those sugared butterfly wings on a ring, rather than that thing."

"So nothing bigger than your hand?"

"Nah. No emeralds, no snake bands, no whatever that is …"

"It may be a preserved eyeball of some sort."

Lily opened her mouth to disagree, but after reminding herself about the butterfly wings, why chance that it really could be an eyeball? "Well, nothing too you know … magical or stands out."

"Screams when stolen or lost?"

"Uh, maybe with a command word."

"There's wedding bands that get hot or cold, depending on the other's mood."

"I'd burn your finger off, Sev."

"Undoubtedly."

"Well, maybe we need to go to a regular store, and then I'd get a better idea. This is a little too … crazy. I need time to think about this. Especially since I need to concentrate on torturing you for six weeks."

"In the normal manner … when no one is spying on us?"

"Normal?"

"For you."

"Oh, well, yeah, I'd like that and more. Much more."

"So before I pick up that box, you don't need any books, parchment, pens, ink or ingredients?"

"No, but you need pajamas."

"Why?"

"We're going to be working and living at the same place, they might see you."

"If any of them check up on us in the middle of the night, they're going to be in for a nasty surprise. I'm not going to tolerate it."

"I didn't mean that, Sev. Though I'll help you pummel, if someone does. I meant like pajamas for polite situations."

"I thought you'd prefer I wear nothing."

"I would, but I have to be practical. Even if we are in some shack alone. Probably a nightgown for me, that way you can get to anything, if the mood strikes you."

Severus sighed. His mood probably would have little to do with it. The only thing he knew, or he hoped he knew, was that Lily needed more sleep than him. Hopefully, that would still be the case. If she didn't get enough rest, she was irritable. Usually towards him.

Their visit to Madam Malkin's was blissfully short. Rather than hampering Lily, he matched her idea with a nightshirt. Nothing he wore would dampen her mood, so why fight it? She refused to let him wear black, so grey. Simple grey cotton since there was no way he'd imitate 'his betters'.

Lily was of two minds. Sev did get pajamas, as she asked, but they were plain and boring. Not that she had nightgowns that were exciting at this point in her life, but at least they were something she liked. Did Tunie wear sexy things to bed now, or nothing at all? Her mum sure didn't. And dad, well, he loved his plaid flannel. Severus was not a plaid flannel sort.

"So let's get the thing and then we'll floo. Are we apparating to your house or mine?"

"Either one. I can leave the box at your house, rather than lugging it back and forth."

"Alright."

***************************

Regulus was already in his room writing a letter to Barty. He needed an invitation somewhere. Anywhere. Slughorn had already moved in. Apparated his fat lardass down to London, beating the train, and had his stockinged feet up on an ottoman while he read the paper and enjoyed a pipe. Kreacher was breathing insults in the hall under his ancestors' heads. While his mother downstairs personally directed the kitchen elves to make a welcome home feast for her men. Merlin on a stick!

***************************

Lily got up early. She didn't go over to Spinner's End with Severus yesterday. He had been rather cagey and snuck off, before her mum could insist he stay for dinner. There was no one waiting for him at home. Lily doubted there ever was.

There were a couple things on Petunia's gift registry that were useful and small enough to put in that strongbox to make it a more appropriate gift. Lily also started on her Divination assignment. This time the subject was herself. She supposed if she could not be honest about her own future, what hope did she have telling others? It might have been more useful to have this assignment prior to choosing her NEWT classes, if one were to believe Divination at all. Maybe there was some way for Severus to check over her project with his barmy arithmancy.

After her dad left for work, Severus showed up at the back door a short time later with a cardboard box.

"What's that?" she asked.

"It can wait. I made it for you last night," he said with a smirk.

"You made me something?" Lily asked, detecting his playful grin. It had to be something silly. What did they talk about yesterday? Darn. They were on the train for hours, then fought in the bank.

"Hm mmm."

Since Lily was waiting impatiently, and appeared to have already eaten breakfast, Severus ate his porridge quickly. After meeting Mrs. Evans halfway across the kitchen with his bowl because she didn't want anyone near hersink, Severus slid the box over to Lily who had taken a position next to the counter.

"I can open it here?"

"Yeah, unless there's someone peering in the windows."

"No, you know what I meant."

"Your mother already knows you and wouldn't be the least bit surprised."

"About what?" she asked, opening it. "What's this?"

"Your crown, my queen."

"Huh?" she said with puzzlement lifting out the tin foil construct. For a wizard, she would have expected something more. Something solid was in the center, giving it firm shape, and Sev had stuck shiny, glittering and winking rocks to it that he must have colored into an assorted rainbow.

"You don't like it?"

"Why did you make it?"

"To see if I could," he replied, holding out his hands.

Lily handed it to him, and he did something at the back and it started playing music and singing.

_In the town where I was born, _

_Lived a man who sailed to sea,  
And he told us of his life,  
In the land of submarines, _

"Oh no!" Lily exclaimed, watching the stones change color to different blues then started shifting to green.

"What? That's a favorite of yours. You sang it all the time."_  
_  
_So we sailed on to the sun,  
Till we found the sea green,  
And we lived beneath the waves,  
In our yellow submarine,_

"That's when I was a kid, Sev," she complained as the whole mess turned yellow. Bright yellow.

_We all live in yellow submarine,  
yellow submarine, yellow submarine,  
We all live in yellow submarine,  
yellow submarine, yellow submarine. _

"Alright," he replied and stopped it. "I was limited to what I could find on the radio. Though you did teach me all the lyrics to 'Henry the Eighth'. I guess I could have sung that."

Lily laughed. She sang about Henry more than the submarine, and sang out, "Hundredth verse, same as the first. How did you do that?"

"We did it in class when we got out of the hospital. Just charm it from the radio, rather than from yourself."

"Can you bring your radio along with us when we go to work? In case we get bored in the evening?"

"It might be able to pick up stations. Not everyplace interferes like Hogwarts."

"So what are you two planning for today?" Mrs. Evans asked.

"Can I go over to Sev's house?"

"I thought you could do magic here now."

Lily made a face and quipped, "I can, but maybe I like leaving the house now and again."

"You just got home from school yesterday."

Lily looked to Severus for some clever help, but he was back to sitting patiently. He did not see a flaw in Mrs. Evans' logic. Two school chums, as they were, could work on homework or other friendly leisure activities here, and in more comfort with the conveniences of indoor plumbing and electricity. Lily would have to come up with her own explanation of why she wanted to be alone and private with him, since he was not her boyfriend, lover or fiancé.

"Am I in trouble for something?" Lily asked.

"Should you be?"

"No. How about we go to the store, Sev?"

"Alright. I could get some food for home, and you can pick out a couple things too for when you do come over. Unless you are going to eat it today, nothing perishable or without sturdy packaging."

"Can't you build something?"

"I guess. I'm still fussing with the kitchen. I changed the color again yesterday."

"Why?"

"To make it look different because mother spent so much time in there. So why don't we stay here for a while to decide what homework you'd like to work on, then we can go to the store, eat lunch at my house and work over there for a bit, and then I'll walk you back for dinner? Is that alright, Mrs. Evans?"

"That sounds lovely, Severus," she answered almost absently, still thinking about what he initially said about his mother. "Why don't you eat here tonight too?"

Lily sneered. How did Severus put it any different than her? He just gave more details, but they'd still end up at his house for hours.

"Maybe tonight, but not every night, Mrs. Evans. That would be too much."

"Lily, we got to get you to the store. Those shorts don't fit properly any more. Change out of those. Another cuppa, Severus?"

"Thank you," he replied, trying to tune out Lily's grumbles. Her bottom was too round for her old shorts. Since last summer, he guessed Lily conservatively gained at least a stone, probably closer to two. They looked painfully tight, but Severus knew he was no judge of fashion.

"What colors have you tried in your kitchen, Severus?" Mrs. Evans asked. He could be prickly regarding his home, but without his parents, Severus had no one. She'd like to help him, and would not mind him living here in their guest room over the summer. Her daughter seemed to ignore her best friend's difficulties. He seemed to prefer that. However, Lily did get him talking about what he was doing at his house, so perhaps he'd keep talking.

"It was originally dark, so I made it yellow. Sort of like here, but when I got home yesterday it was too bright. Now it's a pale yellow, and I added some of those blinds that I had put in the front room that I copied from another house."

"Magic must make it simpler."

"I suppose. I don't think through what I'm doing as much because I know I can always easily change it."

"Do you have anything major planned before you and Lily are doing your summer work?"

"The roof. I can apparate up there and not be seen."

"Did something happen to your hand, Severus?"

He intentionally looked down at his right hand, rather than his left. "I don't think so."

"The other one," she said, moving in to look closer. "Did something bruise it?"

Severus glanced at his left hand. The same darkening of the nail and knuckles for three of his fingers remained. "It's fine."

She tutted as she tried to get her hands on Severus'. He allowed her to get a hold of it after an initial failed attempt where he jerked it away. Flexing his fingers, she asked, "This doesn't hurt?"

"No."

"Did it get exposed to something? This isn't from sunning, but is there some other way to change the color like chemicals?"

"I don't remember."

"How long have your nails been dark like this?"

"I don't know."

"Is it from when you two were sick and turned green?"

"Maybe. It doesn't bother me."

"Mum, what are you doing?" Lily asked, returning in the same shorts.

"Severus' hand looks banged up, but he doesn't know how or when it happened."

"It doesn't hurt," Severus insisted.

Lily joined her mother, and also put her hands on his to look at his fingers. "I hadn't noticed this. I don't think this happened in Potions. You haven't had any accidents. Maybe you aren't eating well, Sev."

"I eat fine," he groused.

"Did you want to go to St. Mungo's, or see if Healer Pye can take a look at it?"

"No," he said firmly. Severus had gotten a couple spells to work so it was how he wanted it.

"But what if this is a symptom of something more serious?"

"Leave it alone."

"I'm going to keep an eye on it, Sev. If it looks worse, you're going to have to get it looked at."

"I'm not."

"Just you wait. Mum, these are the only pair of shorts that sort of fit. I think we need to go to the store today."

"Alright, I'll give your father a call so he'll bring the car home for lunch."

"How about you come along and get some clothes, Sev?"

"More clothes?"

"A couple things for work. Before they get to know you."

Severus made a face. If he was doing dirty work, why would he get new clothes to get ruined? One outfit. "Perhaps. I'll go on my own though."

"Why can't you come with us?"

"I went shopping with you yesterday, Lily. I don't enjoy it."

"What?"

"We disagree over unimportant things. I can go with you sometimes, but not every day."

Lily rolled her eyes at her friend. What they disagreed over was him making bad decisions. Stupid strongbox. Maybe she can pick up something to put in it without him. "Well, what are we going to do today then? I mean, you can stay till lunch, then what?"

"I can go home. I'll come back tomorrow."

"No dinner?" Mrs. Evans asked fretfully.

"I can eat home tonight, and have dinner over here later in the week."

"How about we go upstairs and go over our assignments?" Lily asked, annoyed that Severus was alluding that she was difficult to get along with. It was Severus who didn't have other friends. Lily was very easy to get along with and quite popular at school.

"Alright."

Once they were upstairs, Lily asked, "Why do you have to be so difficult, Severus?"

"Because I don't feel like spending the afternoon shopping for your clothes? "

"Don't you enjoy being with me?"

"If there's a reason for me to be there. I'm sure you'll manage fine without me."

"Don't you want to offer your opinion on things?"

"Clothes? No. Besides, you don't like the clothes I like."

"What kind of clothes would you like me to wear?"

"Whatever you are comfortable in."

Lily pouted, "I'd be comfortable in nothing. Second day home, and we're not ..."

"Clothes that fit properly are important."

"I know," Lily bellyached, moving closer to Severus who was looking down at her desk, where she had her books already stacked. She put her arms around him, before sliding her hands down to the front of his trousers. "I don't want to wait another day."

"Lily," Severus protested, "we said we were coming up here for schoolwork."

"Oh, like you never tell a little white lie?"

"You have a problem staying quiet."

"I'll cast a silencing spell, silly."

"Do I need to get undressed, or can I just take care of you?"

"Take care of me?"

"With my hands, or mouth, if you prefer. I can wait a couple more days."

"That doesn't sound like any fun."

"I'll try to make you forget about that. Do you want to lay down on your back or front?"

"On my bed?"

"Yes, I'll kneel on the far side so if your mother does come in, your bits are pointed the other way."

"My bits. Really. Um, maybe I prefer my back so I can look at you," Lily replied, moving the pillows so she could prop up her head.

"These shorts aren't painful? This middle seam looks like it is digging into you."

Lily shivered as Severus ran a finger over the middle seam that ran over her crotch. "Hurry up."

Severus opened the button and unzipped her shorts. "There is a line where it dug into your waist, and it looks like your knickers are in a bunch. Really," he commented as he pulled them out of where they were snugly tucked into her crevice. He ran a finger under them once they were loosened and reminded Lily, "The silencing spell?"

"Right," she said, before casting it.

That ended their conversation about how tight her shorts were, and Severus did not have to tease Lily's flesh long before her hips started thrusting in response.

Downstairs, Mrs. Evans called up, "Did you two want pizza for lunch?" She could phone ahead, and her husband could pick it up on his way home.

When no one answered, she walked to the bottom of the stairs and loudly called, "Lily?" Hearing no reply, she tried, "Severus?"

Sighing, she climbed the stairs. The door was either closed too far over, or they were doing something and couldn't hear her. Approaching the door which was closed over too far, she repeated, "Lily?"

Mrs. Evans opened the door, calling her daughter's name again, and got an eyeful. At first she did not want to believe that Lily was sprawled like some … whatever and Severus' face was between her legs that were wrapped around his head, while Lily had a tight grip on his hair. Lily's head was thrown back, her eyes were closed and her mouth wide open, but no sound was coming out of it.

She couldn't help exclaiming, "Oh my Lord!"

When they ignored her, she did not know what to do. Stop them? She wanted them to stop, but it was so embarrassing catching them like this. She could not ignore this though.

Lily was trying to catch her breath when she opened her eyes and looked straight up at her mother. She was standing right next to the bed, looking down at her with a look of horror on her face. Oh my God!

Severus got so annoyed when Lily pulled his hair too hard, that he stopped and sat back to look to find out what her problem was. He certainly felt that he was doing what she wanted.

Catching sight of Lily's mother standing over her, he slapped his hands below her waist to cover her up. Without his hair in the way, it was completely visible from where he was kneeling. Probably somewhat visible from the other side of the bed.

Both of them were talking, but the charm was still in effect. Removing his right hand, he took out his wand and waved the movement for _finite._

"... sneak in here?" Lily finished asking.

"I was not sneaking in my own house," Mrs. Evans answered indignantly.

"Rather than arguing, perhaps an explanation first?" Severus suggested.

Mrs. Evans frowned at Severus. Both of them knew they should not be doing something like this. There was something odd about it though. Usually boys wanted something else, and worried little about the girl. She needed to speak with her husband. Petunia never got into trouble like this.

"I doubt there is anything that could explain this."

Lily exclaimed, "Mum, I'm seventeen."

Severus used a spell to get Lily's knickers and shorts back on properly, then calmly said, "I'm not claiming we aren't caught, but there's a reason for this impropriety, Mrs. Evans."

Lily's eyes bugged out. Was Severus going to tell her mum that they were going to get married or something else crazy like that?

When no one said anything, Severus continued, "You may have noticed that Lily was effected by those cursed wounds she received last year. She's unable to resist certain urges. Rare meat, overeating, and a level of constant sexual desire. I know it's not exactly a good reason to say her will power is sapped away by the curse, but that's what it is. Lily did not do this sort of thing before, and when she talked about getting married in a vague, futuristic sense, she did mention that her wedding night would be the first time she would be with her husband … so it's the curse, since it changed her so much."

How did Severus come up with such an almost believable tale? Lily wondered. She did not sound too good in the explanation since Sev was saying that she could not help herself with eating and sex. Lily had will power. Just that she wanted to do what she wanted when she wanted. Nothing wrong with that.

"We weren't told about that."

"Lily wasn't either."

"Mum, it's not like I'm throwing myself at any guy I meet."

"I'm going to need to talk this over with your father. I do not want the two of you doing these sort of things. No matter how irresistible it seems." This was very confusing. She could understand the idea of a curse, but to compel Lily to eat like a horse, and to ask her friend to do things to her body. And Severus, what about Severus? He seemed detached in his explanation, but it had to effect him. Even if they were best friends. He was very unattractive so it was doubtful that someone could overlook his strong attachment to Lily long enough to get to know him. Severus might assume that he and Lily belonged together after saving her life, being her friend for so long, and doing these intimate acts to her. Had they ever gone all the way? Or was it just Severus kissing her mons? Either way, it seemed impossible that he ignored what he was doing because Lily was under a curse.

"It's not as sordid as it could sound, mum. I mean we've tried to think up some solutions, but I don't like any of the boys at school. Severus has even suggested it would be more acceptable if we married, but that seems drastic. We're legally old enough for wizard standards, but we're still in school so that's too young."

Severus was confused. Why was Lily mentioning this to her mother?

"Married!" Mrs. Evans exclaimed.

"Well, I know. I told Severus we couldn't even discuss it once Petunia's engagement started because it would too much for you and dad."

He listened to Lily, but although it was somewhat true, she did not want to marry him.

"I didn't mean that. I meant I agree that the two of you are still in school and what will you live on, since both of you are planning on further education once you are done at Hogwarts? It's impractical and rushed. Isn't there some anticurse thing you can cast or take to control it? Besides the immoral behavior, you're ballooning up, Lily, and getting very unfit"

"Mum! I am not. Besides, if I do a lot of walking this summer, as I've done before, I'm sure to get more trim."

"And who knows what you'll be fed at this fellow's house."

"I doubt it will be knickerbocker glories at every meal."

Unsure of what to do, Severus remained kneeling on the floor, rather than drawing attention to himself. They were arguing over Lily's weight, rather than him getting yelled at to get out and never come back. Her mother believed the curse excuse, or at least for now. Mr. Evans would undoubtedly see it differently.

"Maybe you should not go since you have this disability. Who knows what could happen?"

"If Severus is with me, it's not a problem."

"So … _this_ was going to be going on for six weeks?"

"What do you think's been going on since I got hurt? I mean, I didn't get out of hospital and attack Severus, but we kind of worked up to … you know."

"Are you telling me … months? Months of you …? Lily, this is terrible."

Was Lily believing there really was a curse, or just enjoying the story? She asked him to shag her on a table in the Hog's Head, before the werewolf attack.

"Others do it. It's the 1970s, mum, not the 1870s."

"I don't care what anyone else is doing, you were not raised that way."

Severus glanced at the door. If this happened last year, this is where Petunia would leap in and blame him. Then he could leave, rather than witnessing an argument that was going to go nowhere.

"I've been away at school since before I was a teen."

"Well, obviously this school is not so good if they allow this sort of thing to go on. I may write a letter."

"Don't embarrass me, mum!"

Severus narrowed his eyes. It would not surprise anyone at Hogwarts that students shagged. It was undoubtedly embarrassing to find out that someone as hideous as him was involved. Lily did not want people to know they were more than friends for precisely that reason. He stood. When they both looked at him, he said, "I think I'll go home."

"Perhaps that's best, Severus."

"Mum! Sev … um, I'll send my owl over later, I guess."

***************************

Slytherins! Half a million galleons! Mr. Potter raged at James, "Why did you boys have to mess with Slytherins? When they know you got something you want they can be totally unreasonable."

"What now?"

"Our solicitor received a counter proposal. The boys and the one girl who was only scarred would rather that the one that got turned into a werewolf receive their funds since she has the greatest future need."

James thought that sounded kind of nice. Why was his father having kneazles over that?

"Except they raised the amount to half a million galleons, instead of the 37,100 that was offered in total, including the twenty thousand to the Parkin family."

James choked, "How can they expect Remus to pay that?"

"They don't."

"Why didn't they just say 'no' then? Maybe I can go talk to Evans."

"Is that the girl you tried to attack at the Ministry?" Mrs. Potter asked, reliving the moment of shock in her mind.

"I wasn't attacking her. It was the berk behind her."

"A lad without a wand out," Mr. Potter muttered, shaking his head. "In the middle of the Ministry," he added, then, "with everyone watching."

"It wasn't like that. He started it."

"He didn't even speak. You have to control your temper, or you'll end up joining your friend in Azkaban."

"Evans might know what they have in mind. You said she was throwing her lot in with them."

"That's what our solicitor was led to believe from theirs. I don't want you bothering any of them, James."

James rolled his eyes. He could do as he liked. It wasn't like he was going to kick Snape's arse. He was going to talk to Evans. Maybe over dinner. Yeah, dinner. Someplace nice. Then he could send round flowers the next day so he could then ask her out on a second date. Maybe flying together on his Nimbus and a picnic lunch. Once he told her that he was now on the Chudley Cannons reserve team, and he was training up to be a starting Chaser … well, she'd probably melt into a puddle and there'd be some heavy snogging. Oh yeah. He was playing quidditch, was going to date Evans finally, and just needed to sort out Remus so then they could get a place close to where the Cannons practiced.

"I have an appointment to see Remus today. I'll tell him we're still working on it. Can our solicitor just reply that it's too much?"

"You do know that whatever we pay to this MacDonald, we'll have to at least match it for Parkin. We're not going to be able to afford it."

"But we have that much, don't we?"

"We may. It's not like we count it, but Lupin is not family. Besides, it was Black that got him into this mess. I don't hear you mentioning his name, and how he's going to help."

"Forget about Black," James snarled. If he ever caught Sirius in England, he might turn him in himself. He was a coward and a traitor.

***************************

When her father came home for lunch with the car, her mother only told him that she had something important and that would need lengthy discussion regarding Lily this evening.

He asked her, "Am I going to like it?"

"No, you won't, dad, but at some point I'd like to be included in the conversation since it does involve me."

"We'll see."

"I would rather fill your father in without your interference, Lily. It reflects upon us as parents."

"Don't get all dramatic, mum. It's a curse. None of us can help it."

"I think you could try harder. Now don't go getting your father all worried. He has a long afternoon at work ahead of him."

"A curse?" was all he repeated. Magic stuff. They never had problems with Petunia and curses. If his wife was upset, it had to be a doozy. Reflect upon them as parents? Oh Lord. "So you need more clothes?"

"I've outgrown a lot of my old summer things."

"She's popping out of them," Mrs. Evans explained.

"Hmm," he agreed. Lily's outfit was tight, but he wasn't sure if she was following a current fashion. "None of them tube tops."

"What's that?"

"Never you mind," Mrs. Evans said, while serving slices of pie for dessert.

Although Mrs. Evans usually gave the road her full attention when she drove, today she made an exception after they dropped Mr. Evans off at work. "Could you be pregnant, Lily? That could be the weight gain."

"No, I am not. I also know how it happens so you don't have to pry into that."

"It's only with Severus?"

"Yes. Only him."

"Doesn't he think it strange?"

"What?"

"That you want him to … help you?"

"He's my closest friend."

"That's not what I meant. He knows it's the curse? Not that you think of him as more than a friend?"

"It's complicated. We've talked about it," Lily said evasively. There was no curse.

"Even if he's verbally said he understands, I don't know, Lily. He's alone, without you."

"He's got a couple mates at school."

"Severus mentioned his mother this morning. That empty house can't be good for him."

"What do you want me to do about it? Move in with him?"

"Don't be ridiculous. I'm trying to be serious. Forbidding you two from seeing each other ..."

"But ..."

"Don't interrupt. I was trying to say that keeping you home for the summer, and not allowing him over, would not be fair to him."

"I have a job lined up, and we were going to a wedding together."

"I know. I'm trying to think this through. You've made a real mess out of this, Lily."

"Me?"

"Was it your idea or not?"

"What was my idea … you mean, well, it's not that I knew what was going on at first, but … I don't think I'm going to answer that."

"Besides what I caught you doing this morning, what else have you two gotten up to?"

"I don't think I want to answer that either."

"But you are sure you aren't pregnant?"

"Positive."

Later, when they pulled into the drive with the car with its trunk loaded with bags, Lily squinted to see who was on their front porch. Did Severus come back? She said she'd send her owl over. He also knew they planned to go shopping this afternoon.

She got out of the car to see what he needed, when the person stepped out into the sunlight and greeted her, "Evans!"

Oh no, it was that toerag, Potter. How had she missed his stupid glasses? "What do you want?"

"To talk to you."

"I told you not to come near my house."

"Who's this?" Mrs. Evans asked.

"One of those boys that attacked the pub last summer, and he got expelled over the school year for other things."

"I did not attack that pub."

"The pub?" Mrs. Evans asked nervously.

"Just leave," Lily insisted.

"I need to talk to you about Remus Lupin."

"I don't want to talk to you about the werewolf attack."

"That too?" her mother asked.

"Yes, he was involved with that too." Lily took out her wand.

"No need for that, Evans. The muggles."

"My mum ...?" Lily started to ask or explain, but then thought of Sev's father and the other guys in the pub. Potter and the others did attack her at school. What about here? Her mother? Her house? The car? She grabbed her mother's arm and apparated.

Looking at the dirt packed garden behind Sev's house in Spinner's End, Lily reconsidered this may not have been too smart. Potter was sure to know Severus was close, and a likely place to run.

Mrs. Evans felt very ill, leaned over and threw up.

"Sorry, mum. If I had warned you, then he would have heard. He's attacked me at school and other people. With Sev's dad probably killed by his friend, I didn't think it safe to stay. Severus' house should be hard for him to enter."

Lily looked nervously at the kitchen windows, then turned her head to scan for anyone while holding onto her mother's arm. When she heard the cawing sound, she looked up to see the raven perched on the edge of the roof, looking down at them. "Phi, can you let Severus know we're out here?"

Stupid bird, she thought impatiently as Phi just sat up there. "Mum, can you come with me to the back door?"

Mrs. Evans groaned but did move.

The door opened before they reached the step, and Severus asked, "What are you doing?"

"Potter was waiting for us when we got home. He wouldn't leave."

"Potter?"

"Yeah."

"You apparated your mother?"

"Uh, yeah, there wasn't much time to talk it over."

"Come in," he urged. Phi dropped down and flew in through the door before Severus closed it.

"I thought you said it was safe to portkey and apparate muggles?"

"It is. Mrs. Evans hasn't done it before."

"But I never puked."

"If you did side-along before you knew how, you may have."

"Can I offer you some water, Mrs. Evans? I moved the table and chairs, so if you'd like to sit, we'll need to go into the next room."

"Oh, yeah, let's get you a seat, mum. What should we do about Potter?"

Severus had several ideas about what should be done about Potter. None were legal, and undoubtedly Lily would not keep quiet if he got rid of Potter permanently. Why did she bother coming here?

"We can see if he's still at your house. If he insists on staying or is publicly doing magic, we can apparate to a floo point, and then floo to London to complain to Magical Law Enforcement."

"But can't we get rid of him?"

"Is he in the house or outside?"

"He was outside."

"If he's loud, someone may be watching. We'd have to wait till it got dark."

"What if we're protecting ourselves?"

"I wouldn't rely on being right to absolve us of doing magic in the open."

"Oooh, how I hate them. Lying toerags and their money."

Although she had felt sicker than a dog when they first landed, or whatever, Mrs. Evans had recovered quickly, especially now that she was seated inside. The kitchen had been simple and not modern, but she needed to get a better look to form a firmer opinion. The sitting room had a hollow feel due to all the empty shelves. Lily had said this room had been full of books.

Severus did not have on a jumper. He looked ill with the white undershirt illustrating how sallow his skin was. The oversized jumpers he wore also hid his thinness. He had no hips worth mentioning so the suspenders he wore were probably more effective than a belt.

His arms were wiry, slightly hairy, marked with a couple scars and a nasty burn inside one elbow. His protruding wrist bones bordered on unsightly and were not helped by his bony, long-fingered hands.

Severus turned away from Lily to see Mrs. Evans was staring at him. What did Lily tell her that he could do about Potter? It may not even be Potter alone. Black could be hidden over there, with or without his half-veela.

"We won't know what he's up to until we go back. Perhaps your mother could stay here? If we're detained, the front door does open from the inside for anyone."

"Is there anything mum shouldn't touch?"

"No … oh wait, I traded for some books that I haven't looked at. They may be dangerous. Just leave the books alone." He hoped Lily's mother was not the one that inspired Lily to go looking through everything she touched. Severus did not have anything hidden down here, but the lack of things, compared to the Evans, might rekindle Mrs. Evans crusade to help him. Unless he got caught shagging Lily on their dining room table.

He summoned his jumper from upstairs.

Lily noticed, "You took off the doors."

"As I said, I wanted the house to feel different. Removing the two doors in here doesn't do much, but I can see the stairs and kitchen now."

He then added, "Oh," and summoned a pitcher and drinking glass from the kitchen. He filled it with water from his wand and left it on a stool, next to the worn chair on which Mrs. Evans was sitting.

"Thank you, Severus."

He pulled on his jumper, and Phi swooped onto his shoulder.

"Apparate to behind your shed? I'll cast a shield charm in the direction of the house when I appear."

Lily nodded, and Severus disapparated. She needed to spin a little in place, unlike him, and followed. She appeared behind him. Severus tilted his head to the other side and listened, before turning to say to her, "I don't see or hear him. How about I disillusion you?"

"Shouldn't you be disillusioned, Sev?"

"If he's here and sees me, he's likely to expose himself."

Lily's lip quirked. She knew Severus did not mean the 'expose himself' that she suddenly thought of.

He knew what she was thinking and raised an eyebrow. Now was not the time. He cast the disillusionment on Lily, and recast a different shield charm that was not as strong but moved with him, and slunk out from behind the shed.

"He was on the front porch before," Lily hissed.

"Is your house warded, or can anyone saying _alohamora_ enter?"

"Just look already." She refused to let Severus make this her fault.

Severus snuck up to the back of the house, kept his head beneath the kitchen windows and cast some detection spells.

Lily saw Phi descend, but she flew past like she did not know either of them. At least Lily thought it was Phi, rather than another raven or crow.

Severus waved her up, and then went along the side of the house towards the front. Although hard to see, Lily hurried to catch up while simultaneously trying to be silent. She wouldn't be happy until Potter was face down in the garden with a mouthful of dirt and rocks.

Up ahead of her, Severus crouched, cast something, then stepped into the front garden with his wand ready. He quickly cast something, then said, "Potter, Evans does not want you here."

"Snape? Get out of here, you slimy cockroach."

"I am repeating that Evans wants you away from her house."

"I was going when you put your greasy beak into this."

Lily kept low as she peeked around the side of the house. Potter was standing stiffly on the porch. He was not going anywhere, or he would have taken off when she apparated away with her mum.

"I'm not stopping you from leaving. She does not want you here. Not now or ever again."

"I can go where I like, Snivellus. Maybe it's you that aren't welcome here."

"What are you saying? You refuse to leave, or that you feel that you have the right to come here whenever you fancy?"

"I'm here to take Evans to dinner, you idiot."

Lily's mouth opened in outrage, "You lying scum," and cast a stinging hex at the toerag.

"Hey, I felt that," Potter complained.

"I am not going anywhere with you, and I want you away from my house and family."

"I wanted to talk to you, Evans. About Lupin."

Severus stated, "That's being handled through solicitors."

"Exactly," Lily agreed. "You can't come here and try to bully me."

"I'm not here to bully you. It's also disconcerting talking to a blur."

Lily removed the disillusionment, and replied, "Well, you certainly aren't sweet talking either of us so clear out."

"It's too much money," James said absently, staring at Evans. Those muggle clothes looked horrible on her. Her body was bulging out all over. Had the dragonpox caused her to let herself go like this? She used to be somewhat fit, for someone who didn't fly or play quidditch. She had to have gained at least thirty pounds. Probably because there weren't any good-looking guys at Hogwarts anymore, she felt it wasn't worth it.

"Then Lupin'll just have to stay put. Teach him to trust toerags like you with his secret."

"It's all Snape's fault."

"He's not a werewolf that attacked people. He didn't trust Black. And he certainly wouldn't send a blooming arse like you to negotiate. If this is how you help Lupin, he's better off in prison."

"Evans," Potter exclaimed in disgust. She was supposed to be one of the good guys. "What do you really want?"

"What do I want? I want Mary to live what's left of her life as painlessly and with as little worry as possible."

"But half a million?"

"Get creative, Potter," Severus suggested. "Who put Lupin in that position? Black and the school."

"And what about you Snape? What do you have up your greasy sleeve?"

"MacDonald would not be interested in signing at all, if she did not need money. She's limited by the disability you and your friends caused her."

"No, no. You. What do you get?"

"If I had some ulterior motive, I would not tell you. Would I?"

"You fancy MacDonald getting all that money? Going to promise to take care of her, marry her, and do her in?"

Lily's lip curled. Why were people interested in getting Severus and Mary together? Pure madness. "In case you haven't noticed, you blind toerag, he's at my house, not MacDonald's. Now leave."

"I'm not leaving till this is settled."

"It'll be settled by the solicitors, not through threatening my family or house," Lily replied.

"I didn't threaten anyone."

"That's because you hex first and lie later. You've attacked me at school, attacked patrons at a nearby pub ..."

"That wasn't me."

"Well, you were the one that was caught each time. And you show up here after I told you I didn't want you anywhere near my house."

"When'd you say that?"

"When you tried to kiss me at the Ministry."

"What's a friendly birthday kiss?"

"I'd rather kiss the giant squid."

Potter laughed, then said, "Oh, you'll change your tune, Evans. I'll have you know I got a spot on a professional quidditch team."

"How'd you do that? Kill more potential rivals for it?" Lily asked in disgust. Quidditch!

Brain damage? Severus thought to himself. What made Potter a total and complete arse? Even with limitless amounts of money, how can one person be so oblivious to everything around him? Lily did not care about quidditch. In fact, she could get quite angry if it was discussed ad nauseum. Severus suggested, "Did you buy the quidditch team?"

"I got on due to pure talent, Snivelly."

"Why can't you see I don't want you here ever? I don't want to ever see you anywhere. And I'm going to double the amount because you are such a toerag because Lupin's better off with dementors for company than you."

"There's no need to get so nasty, Evans."

"That's because you are totally unwelcome. I had to apparate, and my mum puked. I am just getting started, if you think this is nasty."

"Obviously you are keeping company with the wrong sort," he said with a look at Snape in his ill-fitting, reeking, moth-eaten jumper with worn trousers that he probably stole off a drunken hobo. Wait a minute, where did Evans take her mother? To Snape's? Was her mother sitting in his house having tea with his hag of a mother? If his father was the muggle, then yeah, taking her to a witch in a wizarding household was a safe bet, if she was in danger. She had not been, but obviously Evans was delusional. Teaming up with Slytherins to negotiate against Lupin and him. Evans would end up with nothing. MacDonald too. Snape was like a slimy barnacle, stuck tight to Evans. If only he had the decency to throw himself in front of Parkin back in November.

"Unlike Lupin, I know how to pick my friends."

"Alright, we'll do it through the solicitors, but you still owe me dinner, Evans."

"I do not. Get lost."

"And when I find up what you and your slimy friends are up to, Snape, you're going to get it," James promised, pointing at the disgusting teen. He apparated before he had to put up with any more of Snape's lies.

"What the hell is wrong with him?" Lily asked.

"He fancies you."

"Ugghh. Stop kidding around about stuff like that, Sev."

***************************

Mrs. Evans felt that the sip of cool, clear water was just what she needed. One of those terrible boys from last summer was at her house, and he had something to do with Lily getting hurt and this horrible curse thing. Why was he at their house? Did he expect Lily to act out her impulses with him? She hoped Severus and Lily set him straight on that.

They left her behind in Severus' house. What was she supposed to do sitting here while they sorted out that boy, who could do magic but the magical authorities let run wild? Since Severus only said not to touch books, that could be interpreted to mean that everything else was at least viewable. She got up and went back to the kitchen.

This shade of yellow he put on the cabinets was wrong. It needed either to go to a pale lemon or back to a bright tint. The pulls on the draws was not right for them either. Nor the floor. He should do something about the floor. And curtains. Not just the exposed venetian blinds.

She opened a couple cabinets before she suddenly realized that the toy furniture on the counter could be the real kitchen table and chairs. Severus had a catalog open next to them with pictures of other table and chair sets. She lifted it and saw from the address that he must have retrieved it from one of her neighbor's rubbish.

Hm, why didn't Lily offer to transform, or whatever they called it, their house? At the very least, Mrs. Evans was tired of the color of the avocado appliances. White. Why hadn't she gone with white? That would never go out of style. Even her washer and dryer, that no one saw, were yellow. Severus did not have any in here, white, yellow or avocado.

She looked at the black stove. Even when she was a child, her parents did not have something this antiquated. Dirty too. There was a large bucket with coal, a decent stack of wood and a pile of newspapers up to her waist. They probably made these black to hide how filthy they were.

Recalling Lily's taunt this morning of moving in with Severus, Mrs. Evans shook her head. Lily wouldn't last in this kitchen one hour. Severus would have to do everything for her. Not that that would be surprising, but what was the use of having a woman around the house if she couldn't cook?

Moving back to the sitting room, it was still the same as before. Empty and hollow feeling with its shelves mostly bare. There were a few books left. Maybe the books that Severus asked that she not touch. Looking at the titles, one of them surprised her greatly so she pulled it out.

The table of contents was what she expected, at least from the title, not something she'd expect Severus to want to read. It was about women getting pregnant, along with how to overcome difficulties in that area, what happened when they were pregnant, and early childhood along with what she supposed were spells. What was this picture? A pregnant man? What kind of nonsense was he reading?

Out of all the books that Lily said packed these shelves, this one was left behind for a reason. Mrs. Evans felt a terrible sense of dread. Either Lily was looking at this, Severus was looking at this, or they were looking at it together. Lily was still seventeen. And with Severus? He was only seventeen himself, born only a couple weeks before Lily.

She panicked momentarily, trying to remember how the book was on the shelf with respect to the others. They were lying on their sides, with the largest on the bottom so this one must have been here. Mrs. Evans stepped back and looked at them. That looked right.

With a nervous glance, she headed towards the stairs. At the top, the door was open to a tiny bedroom, smaller than her upstairs bath at home. Conflicting thoughts were in her head. Severus' room was bare. Not what a boy's room should look like. Reassuringly, his bed was narrow, without room for two.

However, there was another door up here. She opened it. It was Mr. and Mrs. Snape's room. Compensating for the tiny room at the front of the house, this bedroom was properly sized with a full bed and two dressers and a chest at the foot of the bed. The air was stale and musty, and dust covered everything, even the bedspread was grayed with it. Again, Mrs. Evans was saddened thinking about Severus avoiding this room, but heartened that he was not using it with Lily … for whatever they were doing together.

What was taking them so long? She returned downstairs to the chair in the sitting room to wait and think. That book changed things. One of them was serious about having a family. Probably Severus. He was so alone. Did Lily know? The book was not hidden, and Lily did come over here to study or so she said. Or maybe it was Lily looking at it. Other than the pockmarks that she could not help, she had let her appearance slip. Did she already consider Severus as good as married to her? Without a ring on her finger, there were no guarantees. What could she be thinking … and Severus? He was still not over his parents' deaths, and he didn't need Lily complicating things. Especially when she turned a deaf ear to whenever he said something about himself.

***************************

That evening, Mr. Evans was not sure what he wanted to do. Magical curses, Severus touching Lily like that, some other nasty boy that was following his daughter was here, his wife over at Severus' house where she found that book. Education, even that kind was important, but he agreed that keeping that book out of all of them was suspicious. Unless most of the books had been about that sort of thing. And another thing, this had nothing to do with him inviting Severus to Vernon's bachelor party.

When her parents finally got done talking to each other, of course, they had it all wrong when they tried to lay down their rules with Lily. Except they had the part about Severus getting caught with her up in her bedroom. That was the only thing that they sort of had right, except for the part about Lily was under a curse. She didn't correct them on that, or else … who knew what they'd think.

Frankly, they were rather mad. Even though Lily was a child during the 1960s, and was sequestered in a boarding school for the 1970s, things were different now. A curse causing her immoral looseness was not a reason to consider marriage at such a young age. It was a mistake even mentioning that earlier. She meant that Severus and her had considered their options.

Their ideas to fight her urges, such as cold showers and baths sounded odd. And they were even more bizarre because in their version of what was going on, Severus was a victim. Huh? Were they saying that to get her to reveal all the juicy details? Yuck. Well, Lily Evans was not going to fall for something that transparent.

They talked. She sighed. They talked some more. She rolled her eyes. They kept talking till Lily couldn't take it anymore and decided to go to bed.

Her owl was already off to London with a complaint to Magical Law Enforcement about Potter. She didn't expect them to do anything, but there may be an answer regarding at what point she was allowed to cast something at the toerag.

Severus was no help to her the next morning because he listened politely to her mother. Lily made faces at the back of her mum and at Severus, but almost fell off her chair when Severus asked, "What about when Lily is suffering?"

"Suffering?" Mrs. Evans repeated.

"It's a curse," he replied.

Lily looked at him. Was he going to try and tell her mum that Lily would be in unbearable torment if she didn't shag? Oh my God!

Mrs. Evans repeated again,"Suffering?" Before she muttered, "Well, we would not want Lily to be in pain, but you two should exercise restraint. It's not right."

"I understand, Mrs. Evans. Obviously we would not be overstepping boundaries, if it could be helped."

"Why didn't you say something about this last night, Lily?"

"Uh, well, it's sort of personal. I'm still angry that Severus told you about the curse. Though I guess if he didn't, you'd think the worst of us."

***************************

Albus Dumbledore entered the staffroom. Their last staff meeting prior to their own summer holiday was about to commence. He raised an eyebrow at Argus Filch sharpening a pencil to an even more dangerous point with a knife. Usually there was no cause for note taking, especially by Argus. He glanced around to see if the squib was trying to intimidate someone else in the room. If he was, no one was cringing in terror.

Things did not get interesting till the very end. Usually, this was the last chance to poll the staff for the selection of Head Boy and Head Girl. It could not be done earlier due to final grades not being available. Capable as ever, Minerva had prepared the list of new seventh year prefects and any quidditch captains along with their courses and grades.

Argus growled, "What about Snape?"

"He is not a prefect, Mr. Filch," Minerva reminded him. "However, I'll add his grades because I received two interesting letters of support regarding him. Frank Longbottom, who I'm sure you all remember as our Head Boy from Gryffindor in 1975, and Gaspard Shingleton, our current Head Boy from Ravenclaw, both wrote recommending Severus Snape as Head Boy."

Albus looked at Minerva in surprise. Frank Longbottom? He was 100% Gryffindor.

"Who is he?" Silvanus Kettleburn asked.

Albus answered, "He is a Slytherin student who earlier this year received both a commendation for Special Services to Hogwarts, and an Order of Merlin, third class, for saving other students from a werewolf." That reminded him, he still had the Order of Merlin in his office. In his haste to not keep Argus waiting, Severus had left it.

"That again?" Silvanus muttered. Frankly, he was relieved to have those boys out of his class. They caused more mishaps than the beasts.

"I'm afraid that is still haunting us. By the way, this may be a tangent, but an interesting one. James Potter is trying to get Remus Lupin pardoned. On the advice of his family solicitor, the victims or family were written offering money to have them sign a document forgiving Lupin, since he was unaware of what he was doing at the time."

Holding up a hand to prevent the interruption, based on no werewolf is using its human mind while transformed, "Considering the cirumstances, that is. Another student set up the unfortunate events, and students that were aware of the plan, decided to keep quiet. Anyway, an interesting counteroffer was proposed. From what I've been able to find out, it was Mr. Snape's idea. Rather than receiving a token amount, in Mr. Snape's case one hundred galleons, four of them have banded together to ask for a very generous settlement for Miss MacDonald, and ask nothing for themselves."

"How do you …?" Minerva asked.

"Well, between the Wizengamot, solicitors and Mr. Potter asking Hogwarts to shoulder some of the financial burden, since the school left Mr. Lupin exposed for other students to take advantage of, I got wind of it."

"Hogwarts pay?" Poppy asked in confusion.

"It's my fault," Albus sighed. "I made the decision for all the secrecy."

"It was Mr. Snape who suggested the opposite for Miss MacDonald to stay here," Minerva stated. Albus and his damned secrets. They only worked when someone did not use the information simply for their own amusement.

Pomona Sprout added, "Orphaned in the past year too. Thanks to Death Eaters." When she said the last bit, she challengingly stared at the headmaster.

Poppy Pomfrey did not like the direction this discussion was taking. Unfortunately, Horace had a personal emergency and left when the students did. If they wanted to discuss Slytherins, they should wait till Horace was around. With his experience dealing with that house, he saw right through them.

Other teachers then talked about their favorites, getting Poppy's hopes up that Snape would be forgotten. Usually she took no interest in the students' academics because they were all equal in her eyes.

Not everyone voted for both a male and female on their slip of parchment. Some did not have any of these students in their class and thought it best not to judge, and others like Argus Filch, did not have a preference for the second position.

Albus did not vote, but did tally the ballots, recognizing the handwriting of his colleagues. He glanced at Minerva. She voted for Severus, along with Lily Evans. She always voted for the two Gryffindor prefects, unless she had an academically gifted quidditch captain, however there was no male prefect from her house this year. Other heads stayed true to voting for their own prefects. Mentally, he gave the Slytherin prefects a vote each since Horace was absent. Horace occasionally crossed house lines, but without him here, Albus could not make a better educated guess as to his vote.

The total was clear that Severus Snape not only outnumbered others, but somehow gained a majority of votes. He went through the parchment stack to reconcile his calculation because it seemed off. Filius voted for his, Pomona for hers, Poppy for the Hufflepuffs, and then Rubeus only voted for Evans. However, how did Severus obtain Silvanus' vote? Didn't he ask less than a half hour ago who Severus was? Additionally, Severus did not take Divination, but gained that vote along with another for Evans, who did take that course. Rolanda Hooch only voted for quidditch players, so Severus had not gained her vote.

He checked his numbers for Head Girl. Lily Evans had enough votes to make Head Girl.

Albus cleared his throat and announced, "There is a majority for Head Boy, but I'd be remiss if I did not point out that for some unknown reason Voldemort's followers have targeted Severus Snape. Perhaps drawing more attention to him would not be wise."

Poppy stared at the headmaster. Why hadn't he said this before? From what she had heard, Snape and a number of his Slytherin friends were likely to join up with He Who Must Not Be Named.

Albus shifted uncomfortably as he noticed some of the staff exchanging glances, before Minerva rebuked with her r's rolling due to his comment heating her blood, "Mr. Snape has more backbone than that, if you haven't noticed. Between you and Horace's prejudice, it's little wonder that he's treated like a house elf."

Even though she had not voted for him, Pomona did not like unfairness, "He's an excellent student, Albus. Even was on my list to work the greenhouses early in the morning when we had that horrible weather."

"Hard worker. Never gives me lip," Argus growled.

Filius quipped, "Are you sure it's only that? He did show up Peeves in the main staircase."

"The foul thing was chasing his familiar from the top of the tower all the way down to the basement. Could have killed the poor bird from exhaustion."

"Oooh, that's right. Sorry, Argus. That is a fine animal, and quite right that it should be protected," Filius replied.

Also disliking back room politics, Rolanda commented, "Fair is fair. You said yourself that he saved other students. His grades are good, and he has more classes than some of these other choices."

"He lacks leadership," Poppy inserted. "Shouldn't the Head Boy be a role model?"

"Poppy, Albus told us earlier that Severus convinced two Slytherins to band together with Evans and him to attempt to get a settlement for Miss MacDonald, a Gryffindor," Minerva presented. "He may not be a hero on the quidditch pitch, but when there's a right and a wrong, he clearly sees his path and quietly tries to make others see it too. Did you read what he had published in The Quibbler?"

Albus' mouth dropped open. He had almost forgotten about that. Where did Severus find the time for all this?

Socrates Upsilon broke character and said in English for everyone's benefit, "He's a natural philosopher, given to deep thought."

Also unlike the distracted wizard he normally was, Atlas was here and now. "What are you talking about, Albus? You never cared about his well-being before. Bloodied lips and black eyes in class, knocked down the stairs all the time, set on fire in Potions, and you encouraged those bullies until they got so bad that another student ended up dead. I know you don't care much for serious academics such as what we get up to in Arithmancy, but I've seen Severus Snape's intrinsic understanding of magic. He's already made one discovery that was published in The Practical Potioneer, and I expect, if left to work on things in peace, we can expect many more."

When faced with what could degenerate into a trial of his own character, Albus was somewhat startled. He had merely suggested it would be in Severus' best interest not to be elevated above his peers due to the unwelcome attention he already received. Personally, he felt that he owed Severus for his accidental mishandling of many incidents, and he was due for something. However, Albus was not looking to put a bigger target on him. Even the staff that that did not vote for Severus, yet were willing to abide by the vote, said, "Very well, I suppose Severus Snape will be Head Boy, and Lily Evans will be Head Girl next year. You'll take care of that, Minerva?"

"Of course, Albus. I'll send those letters out with the others in about three to four weeks."

After the meeting and wishing everyone a pleasant holiday, Albus returned to his office to think. It was odd. Minerva was right that Severus Snape was not a quidditch player to be admired, and in fact, he was homely and had an abrasive personality. How did he gain attention and support? His blood status put him at a disadvantage in Slytherin, yet he was able to negotiate with them when it was important. If he was magically influencing those around him, why not Horace? Out of all the staff to get singing his praises, Horace would be the most important. He could not help laughing to himself that perhaps Severus preferred Argus to Horace. Severus certainly walked his own path, with little regard to what everyone else did. Albus could not perceive the reasoning behind much of it, but as more things were exposed, Severus definitely seemed to ascertain the right direction. Such as when Severus threw down the gauntlet at the Ministry in The Quiddler.

Struck with the sudden idea that Voldemort might have access to a prophecy regarding Severus, Albus leaped out of his chair and raced to the North Tower. His staff evaporated after that last meeting, and he may have missed his opportunity to speak with his resident expert on Divination. Usually he did not put much stock in that subject, not being gifted in it himself, but there were a few that swore by it, if you found someone with the gift. There were a lot of fakes out there.

He caught Prof. Augury coming down the ladder, wearing a rucksack and semi-muggle clothing.

"Ah, I caught you."

"What is it, Albus?"

"Why did you cast your lot for Severus Snape?"

"So much for the anonymity of those ballots … um, well, none of the other lads took Divination, and the Snape boy was the subject of Evans' yearlong project so I knew him in a way."

"Project?"

"To test their skills, and to weed out those that have the gift from those that don't. NEWT students over the summer have to pick two very separate subjects and predict their upcoming year. Miss Evans did a lovely job on her mother, and only had one flaw for Mr. Snape."

"What was that?"

"She got something rather backwards, but it's understandable. All the signs were present for something favorable, but considering the only thing that occurred at that time was the death of both his parents, it's considered a failed prediction."

Albus gave it a moment's thought to what he knew of the situation. He was not sure of the influence Severus' father had on him, or maybe he did. Mr. Snape did not care for awards and ceremonies, and Severus seemed to share that opinion. At seventeen, he may have had little future effect on his son. Severus' mother … even though it was a terrible oversight on his part, if Eileen had lived, he felt Severus would have left Hogwarts to care for her. He was inclined to agree with Atlas' prediction that there was a lot of potential in Severus. Not finishing school would be disastrous. The possibility for being trapped to care for family struck a chord with Albus. If his mother had died sooner, would Albus ever have taken his NEWTs?

"Do you still have her project?"

"Yes, but it does not cover further. We'll have to go up to my office."

"Oh, so you had no _feelings_ regarding Mr. Snape?"

"Not really. I mean, everyone else said good things about him. What are you looking for?"

"I don't know. I have no idea why Voldemort has any interest in a student. I agree with Atlas that the dragonpox that Mr. Snape received was definitely from an old curse, considering that Miss Evans also contracted a case that was synchronized with his. Curses like that are not cast about willy-nilly. I have not found the connection during the werewolf attack, but Black left the country so fast, no one had time to question him thoroughly regarding his connection to Voldemort, whether directly or through his family. That followed by a Death Eater attack against his muggle father, in an area with no coverage by The Daily Prophet, contrary to their usual tactics."

"I doubt you'll find the connection in his horoscope. The Dark Mark does not show up in predictions."

"I got to thinking perhaps there's a Prophecy, and Voldemort is trying to circumvent it."

"Oh no, you've been listening to Socrates, haven't you? There's no way out of a Prophecy. Look at that Oedipus guy. Anyway, Prophecies are rare. Half the time, the seer's alone and no one witnesses it. The only one that knows is locked up in the Ministry dungeon filing their stupid, and probably mislabeled glass balls. Fat load of good that does, doesn't it?"

"Undoubtedly it's sometimes better for no one to know since they'd go through any lengths to prevent the unavoidable."

Pulling open a drawer in his office, Prof. Augury replied, "Prophecies are vague. Hardly ever names names. Enough detail needs to be given to define who or what it refers to. Sometimes it means nothing to one, yet everything once the right person hears it. Still, as I said, unavoidable. Here's Evans. That's her mother, and this one born in 1960 is the student."

"So what's it say?"

"What? About this past school year? Isn't that in the past?"

"I mean for what's coming up."

"That wasn't the assignment, headmaster."

"But don't you have enough here to tell something?"

"Is this important? I was hoping to get home by nightfall."

"It could be."

With a huff, he lifted the birth chart and slowly spun the circular diagram. "Uh, quiet, reserved, but deep and emotional … with oh, I'd say resourceful and formidable. And sensitive. Concerned about … not others per se, but what makes them tick. Is that enough?"

"No," Albus replied. Clarifying his disappointment, he said, "I need to know where this is leading. All that I know, or maybe not. He's a puzzle. Very stubborn."

"Oh yeah, stubborn is here too. Actually, I may take back the sensitive, he's tough. Feels things, but I'd say he'd strike back, rather than wallow in it."

Albus snorted at that.

"Am I right or wrong?"

"Oh no, you are spot on. Could you please look into this for me?"

"Uh, I guess I have all I need here since Evans lists his information at the top. Do you have a deadline, or can I work on this at my leisure?"

"The sooner, the better."

The Divination teacher sighed, then added, "If I can take a look at his palm, that would show everything."

"How would that show why or what is causing what is going on?"

"Oh, so you just want to know why. I thought you were concerned with the possibility of this student dying in the near future. He has enemies. That much is certain."

"He definitely has them?"

"Undoubtedly from what Evans got in this tarot layout. Am I doing this secretly, or can I try to get him to do cards and see his palm for myself?"

Albus scratched his chin, and then responded, "Let's start with secretly."

***************************

Lily was feeling rebellious. Severus was following the rules. They could work at the kitchen table, talk with a little privacy on the front porch with all the windows behind them, and even went to Spinner's End for a couple hours with her mother tagging along. It was unbearable.

She wasn't happy with the response from Magical Law Enforcement either, but that Gumboil bloke was going to pay the Potter house a visit to personally deliver the message that James Potter was not welcome at the Evans. What good was that going to do?

Also, when her mother tried to have a private girl chat about what a woman could do with herself without a man, well, that absolutely took the cake! Lily didn't want to hear it, and certainly did not want to point out that touching herself was nothing like being with Severus. It did not make sense, but it was the absolute truth.

Petunia left some of her younger items including some records, cassettes and some instructions regarding discofox, so they spent some time goofing around with that. Lily was not sure who'd she know at the upcoming wedding, so she wanted to make sure that Severus did not trip over her.

Though by the day of Frank and Alice's wedding, Lily was wondering if all this curse talk might not have a slight bit of truth. She just wanted to drop the gift off and drag Severus into a closet, or apparate back to Spinner's End or anyplace they could get in a hot, sweaty shag.

She felt guilty. Severus seemed to be looking forward to today, and he had reminded Lily that she had no responsibilities, unlike Petunia's wedding, so she might find it enjoyable too. Undoubtedly she would, and was looking forward to seeing a wizard wedding. She also felt she'd be squandering her first day at possible freedom since the holiday began.

Severus went over to Lily's early, with his clothes for the wedding. Lily wanted him to shower at her house and use her shampoo. He told her that his soap was fine. That's what shampoo was after all, just with a lot of water added. He was not sure which mode Lily was in with this, always-right Lily, thinking-she's-cute Lily, or perhaps the remote chance that it was wanting-to-shag Lily, even though both her parents would be in the house. Maybe if the wedding and the party afterwards did not last well into the night, they could stop somewhere else before he brought Lily home. He was not opposed to love making, just the thought that it was all Lily wanted him for. Severus wanted Lily's companionship, not constant nagging about whatever caught her interest. He was going to attempt saving his arguments for important matters to see if that led to any improvement over the summer. Severus had tried it with mixed success in the past. Hence, showering at the Evans' and using the shampoo Lily picked out for him as long as she did not claim his hair was not normally clean.

Lily tried to talk Severus into letting either her or her mum trim his hair. Just a little. It was not any longer than it normally was, but Sev claimed he never got it cut. It was some sort of magic thing, and he had heard of a couple Slytherins getting unwanted haircuts when they were young and they'd wake up with their hair restored the next day. That was just plain strange.

Both her parents looked at her robes critically. They agreed the color was perfect, as Severus predicted. Neither was sure they were worth the price though. They were silk, and magically stain resistant and dirt repellent so Lily felt they should be wearable multiple times.

Even though Severus mentioned his shirt would match Lily's robe to Mr. Evans, when Lily's parents saw them together, they appeared to be a couple, rather than good friends.

Mrs. Evans got Lily on her own and asked her about that. Lily replied, "He had all black at first. When he changed to a white shirt, it was worse. Like a vicar. He wouldn't change the robes. Sev has some thing with all those buttons."

Her mother shook her head. Either Lily was an item with Severus, especially with her obvious trust in asking him to perform intimate acts on her, or they were friends. Just friends.

***************************

AN: I was studying the photo of the Spinner's End kitchen from the movie, hence the blinds and pale yellow that will age poorly. There looks like there is a phone cord on the floor in the doorway between the kitchen and the living room. I'm also puzzled by the black boxlike thing on the living room wall, just next to the door to the kitchen. If it was near the front door, instead of on another wall, I'd guess doorbell chime.

"Always forgive your enemies - nothing annoys them so much." - Oscar Wilde

Beatles "Yellow Submarine"

And to torment those that know the song -

_I'm Henry the eighth I am  
Henry the eighth I am, I am  
I got married to the widow next door  
She's been married seven times before  
And every one was an Henry (Henry)  
She wouldn't have a Willy or a Sam (no Sam)  
__I'm her eighth old man, I'm Henry  
Henry the eighth I am_

Second verse same as the first 

***************************

Is there where I put my delay excuses about life? LOL

I do not AC the house, and the high humidity for more than a week was eating away at my head (I suffer from migraines with odd triggers). Temporary, but I wish the weather report promising relief for days would came true sooner.

I also have two unrelated little kittens that were found and get bottle fed around the clock. They get older and more independent faster than human babies so that's also temporary.

I've stepped up my job search to include places to which I don't want to commute. I have not gotten to the ones that may take over an hour and a half each way unless via train. I worked at home for the past six years, although crazy hours. The most time consuming thing is using each company's web site to reenter my info, for the ones that don't take a direct feed from the job search sites to pick up my profile.


	42. Chapter 42 Longbottom Wedding

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 42 Longbottom Wedding

Lily's dad got out his camera and made Lily stand around for obligatory pictures since she was dressed up. Severus got dragged into a couple, and it wasn't until later when they were developed that Mrs. Evans noticed that he purposely let his hair fall into his face to cover his deeply pitted pockmarks.

Severus cast a feather weight charm on the gift, even though Lily said she only added some fabric things to it. He wasn't sure of the need for someone to own place mats, but napkins along with fancy holder rings made a bit more sense to him. Longbottom seemed like the sort to have what the Evans referred to as 'smart dinner parties'. Since Slughorn had his parties and his dinners, it seemed likely there was an equivalent in the wizarding world, even though Severus had never been invited to any. Lily attended some of Slughorn's so she'd know better.

He only noticed Lily's parents giving her stern glances, rather than admonishing her to get home early, don't drink too much, behave herself so as not to be an embarrassment, including getting Severus into her knickers.

The curse idea was rather curious since both her parents were not blaming him for touching Lily. Maybe he had misunderstood what he had heard about females, their virtue, and only their husband was allowed to touch them. Most of that he had learned from Lily. There was also a part he observed at school over outrage when some drama erupted, but it never involved Severus. Until this year, that is, and he had limited himself to Lily so there was not some drawn out stories involving notes to keep track of all the people involved.

Severus apparated the two of them since it was a bit over the prescribed apparition range. Normally, Lily would have tried it on her own after Severus had shown off by side-alonging her to Mould-on-the-Wold that one time, but she did not want to risk splinching when she had somewhere to be, and was already dressed for it.

Initially, she thought they ended up in the middle of nowhere because there were no buildings in sight, but then she saw a white thing in the distance when Severus pointed to it. "What's that?"

"Maybe a tent?"

"It's big."

Severus turned in place. That was the only likely destination.

There were two pops of someone apparating behind them, and another couple, much older than them, had appeared. Lily studied their clothes to compare them to theirs, but Severus thought he knew these people from somewhere. The eyeglasses tipped him off. It was Potter's father, and presumably his mother. He had not looked at her carefully at the Ministry.

Severus got between them, and hissed at Lily, "Bend down and fix your shoe."

"What?"

"It's Potter's parents. Let them lead."

"Are you sure?"

"I think so. I recall him from somewhere, and the only thing I remember is Potter's father had the same round spectacles."

Lily tried to look around Severus. Stupid dress robes. She reached his leg to pull him out of the way, and as he turned, she noticed he had his wand out. The Potters, if that's who they were, were already walking towards the white tent. Talk about bad luck.

"You're not going to cast something at them, are you?"

"Not unless they cast something at us. I'm waiting to see if Potter, the younger, apparates to the same place."

"He didn't cast anything at my house."

"I think our dress robes would be too tempting for him to ignore."

Lily gritted her teeth. She spent a lot of money on these. Stupid toerag would probably think it hilarious to dispel them. Whether he left her in her undergarments or completely starkers, like he did to Severus, would be the question. She also took her wand out and was ready to hex first. Can't even go to a wedding without having to worry about that immature pain in ass.

"Maybe we should catch up to that toerag's parents. Warn them that we'll defend ourselves."

"Why?"

"So no one will be surprised when little Potter's mummy's naked bum is on exhibit. Won't be so funny then, will it?"

Since Lily was already rushing off to waylay the Potters, Severus decided not to call after her. His voice might carry and they'd hear. Perhaps Potter learned that sort of behavior from his parents, and they'd end up in a duel against them. Lovely. Maybe Lily would reconsider moving to another country where their law enforcement actually did something to protect people. Britain was welcome to keep Potter, Dumbledore and He Who Must Not Be Named.

"Oi!" Lily called.

Mr. and Mrs. Potter turned to see who was calling out. It was the young lady in green who was near the apparition point. Since she was in dress robes, along with the young man, they were surely here for the wedding, like themselves.

"Are you the Potters?"

"Yes," replied Mr. Potter, "and you are?"

"Lily Evans, and that's Severus Snape. We're here for the wedding, but if you or your son attacks us, we will defend ourselves."

"This event is by invitation only."

"We're invited. Unless you throw some money around and demand we get chucked out."

"What are you talking about?"

"After six years of your son, I know what your lot do. All charm when the constables are about, but nasty toerags when they're not around. Giving out gifts and stupid Nimbus brooms to everyone who claps for your inane pranks and laughs at your jokes."

Mrs. Potter's mouth dropped open in shock. This woman was giving them an earful because of her Jamie? This was the girl at the Ministry that Jamie wanted a kiss from, and that young man in the black dress robes was his imagined nemesis, Snape. Oh no. Meeting up with them socially. Fortunately, Jamie was not here. It was quite clear he and his brand of humor would not be welcome at a serious event, such as this wedding. He had attacked the bride at Hogwarts, even though he denied it. The couple in question firmly believed he, or one of his friends, had, and they issued the invitations. They were old acquaintances of Frank's parents so the invitation was clear. No children allowed, even seventeen year olds who passed their apparition exams and were now fancying themselves as professional quidditch players.

"He's gotten over that phase," Mr. Potter explained.

"No, he hasn't. He was at my house last week threatening my mum over money. Bullying toerag."

Severus blinked. There was no mention of threats last week. If Potter had threatened Mrs. Evans, Lily would have said something, and there would be little doubt that between them, Potter would regret it. Gryffindor exaggeration was a two-way street, it seemed. He had his wand ready for when this degenerated past lies, name calling and the jinxes started. Gryffindors maturing, what a joke. Perhaps Severus should throw some of those galleons around. His pile of gold may not be bigger than Potter's, but he would not miss it as much as them. And there was still Black and Dumbledore.

Mrs. Potter hissed at her husband, "I told you. He didn't listen to me, and that's why Magical Law Enforcement was at our house again. Jamie's going to end up in a lot of trouble."

"Not now," Mr. Potter replied lowly to his wife. "I can assure you that my son will not be present today."

Not satisfied, since his son was a constant liar. Lily warned, "Well, I'll hold you to that then. If I see one hair of his messy head, you'll get a first hand demonstration from us on how he treats people."

"What?" Mr. Potter exclaimed, annoyed that this girl dared to threaten them.

"I sincerely hope that the two of you are wearing your best underwear today," Severus added with a smirk, knowing exactly what Lily meant.

Seeing the horrified look on Mrs. Potter's face, Lily added, "Oh, he undressed half the girls at Hogwarts, including the bride, and who knows how many lads. I'm sure you're used to that sort of thing at _your _house," using the sort of emphasis that Petunia had perfected when speaking of magic and Severus.

Not being the only guests, their glaring standoff lasted for less than a minute as Minerva McGonagall walked into their midst in a dress robe that included a good amount of tartan.

"Professor," Lily greeted brightly.

"Miss Evans, Mr. Snape," she greeted the students with a nod, before addressing the adults, "Mr. and Mrs. Potter." Minerva sensed from a distance the tension between the two pairs. Not seeing the probable cause, she asked, "Is James here?"

"No, he had another engagement," Mr. Potter replied. "He's on the reserve team for the Chudley Cannons now, and it takes up a great deal of his time. Professional quidditch is very demanding."

Lily rolled her eyes. Quidditch. She wasn't sure if James Potter really was busy doing some quidditch thing, but his parents sure seemed proud that their son's career was playing a game. His years at Hogwarts were probably considered a waste of time since Potter claimed he was a natural on his Nimbus and already knew everything there was to know about flying and quidditch. Lily would not have paid him any attention, but his complaints, along with Pettigrew repeating his every utterance ad nauseum, really got under Helen's skin.

Not knowing whether the Potters were anything like their offspring, other than being liars too, Severus considered staying close to McGonagall a safe bet. Her sense of fairness was good, unless overrode by Dumbledore. If anything happened, she'd at least be a witness, and perhaps not subject to Potter's bribery.

"It's lovely seeing you here, Professor," Severus muttered in her direction.

Minerva heard him. Usually he let Miss Evans speak for him, sometimes even when a direct question was posed to him. When he did speak, Severus could be sarcastic. A Slytherin happy to see the head of Gryffindor socially? Ripe for sarcasm, but it wasn't there, or at least she didn't detect it. Severus was quite clear when he was being sarcastic. She had heard him employ it numerous times against the Marauders, and occasionally at the headmaster and at his own head of house. So the question was, why would he be pleased that she was here? Since they had not reached the venue, Miss Evans and him had only met the Potters so far. Her eyes narrowed at James' parents. What had they been discussing? Evans and Snape were not to blame for their son's behavior. A couple months ago, even after Potter had been expelled, she had her students lined up at the Ministry to return to Hogwarts, when Potter strutted in, and pulled his wand on them. If his parents refused to acknowledge the source of the problem was their son, that could be a problem for his victims.

"Are you Miss Evans' date?" Minerva responded. Severus was dressed very respectfully, although mostly in black with only a small allowance of green to match Lily's robes. It was a shame Lily was adding on pounds, but unlike Mary, she did not have the outlet of transforming every month to keep herself slim. Admittedly, the worst method for weight control. Additionally, the dragonpox both had suffered from was still clearly evident, especially on Severus.

"I guess. My invitation said I could bring a guest."

"Severus has been corresponding with Frank since he graduated," Lily added. "Auror training is fascinating. Frank suggested Severus consider it as a career, but he's not keen on a Ministry job."

Mrs. Potter was puzzled. Snape was a friend of Longbottom's? Jamie said he was a friendless oddball who enjoyed the Dark Arts. Minerva McGonagall was allowing them to walk along with her as they went on to the wedding.

To her husband, she said, "I think Jamie lied. About many things."

"Undoubtedly. I was suspicious when Gumboil showed up and told James to stay out of muggle towns entirely."

"Threatening a muggle, a year after what they did at that pub."

"What are we to do with him?"

"He's seventeen. What can we do?"

Further ahead of the Potters, Lily was doing most of the talking. By the time they reached the young members of the family with a seating chart, Minerva knew that neither had been to a wizarding wedding before, Lily's muggle sister was recently married with Lily playing a large part helping to arrange things from afar, and that muggles had weddings in a lot of their dramatic entertainment programs on their televisions.

Although Lily's falsehoods during her conversation did not hurt anyone, Severus thought it farcical for Lily to claim she did anything beneficial for Petunia's wedding considering all she did was complain about it.

Severus did know that wizarding weddings were equally complicated from what Rosier had explained, except Rosier knew better than to claim he did more than get roped into some menial tasks, rather than claiming to mastermind the event.

Whereas Petunia's had been at a local church, this one was being held outdoors, but there were so many golden chairs set up that a similar number of people could view it. Since any sort of weather magic was forbidden, an enormous, white tent had been erected. For now it seemed a nice day, however a tent was wise, considering this was Britain.

He was directed to a separate tent where gifts were to be left. It was already half full. A wedding with a large number of people invited did have a tangible benefit. Lily would probably want a lot of guests and gifts, since Petunia did. Actually she'd want more than Petunia. Severus sighed. Even though he did not normally receive gifts, and the idea of them was sort of tantalizing, was all this worth it? What did people do with gifts they did not need or want? Severus still had Phi. She had grown on him, but inanimate objects did not have the same advantage.

Severus rejoined Lily with McGonagall, with Sprout too now, after scanning the people around them for any Potters, or Black, or anyone else that he knew was dangerous. He had seen Dumbledore among some other old wizards over to the side. Some of them were also wearing pointed hats, but none compared to the headmaster's bad taste. He was wearing some canary yellow outfit, with orange whatevers … he didn't know what it was supposed to be, but he'd see Dumbledore coming in that.

Lily was happy when Severus returned to her side. Just because Potter's parents said he wasn't here, didn't mean he wasn't. She followed her friend's glance and spotted the headmaster. What was he wearing? With his hair and beard, he looked like a giant, lint-covered piece of candy someone dug out of the bottom of their purse.

Struck by the similarity to Parkin's funeral, Severus noted that the guests socialized until it was time for the actual ceremony, and then took their seats. Was that the same wizard that was at Parkin's funeral? He looked like the same man, but neither time was his name given. If it was, his message was different, yet similar to what was said at Petunia's wedding. Lots of promises that lasted forever. Maybe because real magic was involved with this ceremony, that's why muggles found it so easy to undo marriages. There was no real power keeping muggles together, except legal reasons.

Oakby's dress was not much different than Petunia's. It was a white gown with a long skirt in back. She also carried flowers. Roses too. Severus had been hoping for something special. It was rather boring, since it was a repeat of something he had only seen a month ago. Now that he had seen both kinds, perhaps he could skip these in the future.

This was exactly what Lily wanted. This was simpler and nicer than Petunia's wedding. She wouldn't be able to marry most wizards in a church anyway, since they seemed to be even more ignorant than Severus.

At the end of the ceremony, everyone was asked to stand and the sides of the tent disappeared, and their chairs reconfigured around tables surrounding a dance floor, while a band got comfortable. Although it was something magical, Severus wished for some romantic spectacle like flowers or petals raining down, fake magical doves trailing ribbons or even rice falling out of nowhere. What was the point of it being a wizarding event if it looked so much like a muggle one? Perhaps imagination and individuality were discouraged. The moderator, or whatever that wizard's title was, might not like couples deviating from whatever guide they followed.

"Let's make sure we get good seats," Lily urged, grabbing his elbow.

"How is that determined?" Severus asked.

"Close enough to the bride and groom to see them, but we shouldn't shoulder our way in, because they probably have lots of family here. And close to the dance floor, and it looks like they have waiters with trays of drinks, so that won't be a problem."

His eyebrow raised, questioning Lily's need to prove she knew something, but then ended up talking nonsense. If Longbottom and Oakby danced, they could see them from anywhere under this tent. Among the guests, he did recognize former students, but they were from Gryffindor or Hufflepuff, except for Shingleton. Was there some Head Boy club? Not caring to sit with any of them, Severus suggested, "Why don't we follow McGonagall and Sprout? They've probably attended dozens of these. If Dumbledore's at their table, we'll just go to another one with similar attributes." He also kept his eyes open for the Potters. Severus definitely did not want to get stuck sitting with them, next to them, or with them behind him.

"Stupid toerag," Lily muttered while narrowing her eyes at the headmaster. He was easily spotted in that robe. There were graduated Gryffindors whom she knew here, but she had not been close to them. She had been closer to Longbottom, and anyone who was a prefect obviously, since they interacted with younger students, but others she wasn't sure she exchanged more than a general pleasantry. Sitting with teachers was going to be awfully dull. She pulled on Severus' arm to steer him to the table next to McGonagall. The professor's was filling up with a group of older people, and none of them looked festive. That was undoubtedly Sev's attraction to sitting there.

No one young stayed seated very long for it to matter where they sat. Lily reconnected with a number of graduates. Severus did dance with her today, and spent half the afternoon on the dance floor with her. He also danced with McGonagall and Sprout once each. It was strange since he had not asked either one to dance. They assumed he would, when Lily was occupied. Although Lily was talking to other wizards, she already knew these ones, and had danced with him enough times for anyone to know they were here together. Although she smiled now and then, it was not the look Lily gave him when she was excited. In his mind, Severus saw that look on her face when he imagined how Lily would tell him she had found her one and only true love.

Things had been going well, with Longbottom and Oakby being brief and to the point when they conversed, since they had to speak to more guests. The Potters avoided them, though Severus thought he saw Potter's father give him a dark glare every so often.

His luck ran out when he turned and found himself face to face with the headmaster. Even though Dumbledore looked Severus in the eye with delighted recognition, he tried to avoid him by muttering, "Excuse me, sir," in an attempt to behave like he was already engaged in some other activity.

Albus took hold of Severus' elbow and exclaimed, "Ah, Severus. I had seen you earlier. These are some very nice robes."

Severus' eyebrows could not help rising. Who was Dumbledore to offer compliments regarding clothing? Especially with cheddar colored flowers slowly rotating upon his robe. They were absolutely ghastly. In response, he merely grunted. It was sometimes useful to be a male teen.

"So how had your holiday been so far?"

The same noncommittal grunt was given, and Severus tried to turn away. Dumbledore tightened his grip. What was wrong with the old man? He had to know Severus wanted nothing to do with him.

"Any plans for the rest of the summer?"

"No."

"Miss Evans said the two of you would be working for a Potions Master."

"So?" If the fool had already spoken to Lily, what did he need to waylay him for?

"That's wonderful."

"Hm."

"Have you already gotten a start on your assignments?"

"Yes."

"You have more courses than most."

Severus grunted again. He did not know what the careless bastard was fishing for, but he wasn't going to find it in his answers. Crouch was taking all twelve subjects so there was no comparison to be made since Severus felt the squirrelly, crazy eyed Slytherin might actually get an OWL in each of them.

"Is everything alright with you, Severus?"

"Hm."

Albus knew Severus did not like him. He had made too many mistakes with this student to believe otherwise. However, he did want to reconcile and let the young man know that he was available. "Do you need anything? Even though you are seventeen, the wizarding community can be close minded, and leave you feeling alone."

Severus sneered. Who's fault was it that he was alone? Doubting that Dumbledore would oblige him by dropping dead here and now, he murmured, "No."

"I mean it, Severus. Even if it's financial help. Until you are out of school and employed in a profession, I realize it's difficult. You would not be the first student that Hogwarts or myself assisted."

Hogwarts assisted students? Severus did not know what criteria was needed for this assistance, but he needed it a hell of a lot more in his first six years, than now. Miffed, he gave a longer reply, "I ended the year with all the uniforms I replaced several times over due to your precious favorites. So no, your offer of assistance is too late."

"Uniforms?" Albus repeated in confusion.

"They are required so when a prank involves destroying or banishing my uniform, I have to buy or acquire replacements." With a nod towards the groom, Severus added, "I got shoes from Longbottom."

"When did …?"

"With all the girls and younger students that were attacked in the halls and loos, your funny Gryffindors might as well have been working for Madam Malkin's. They don't respect other people's lives or property, and it's the victim's responsibility to sort it without any assistance from you or whatever program you claim the school has. Attending Hogwarts should require a waiver signed by parents, letting them know students attend at their own risk. You are obsessed with appearances and waste your time gadding about, rather than being a culpable party to what happens at the school."

Albus had wanted Severus to talk. Taking the headmaster to task was not what he had in mind, but it did give Albus something to think about. Appearances and gadding about? Small wonder Severus rubbed Horace the wrong way. And the thoughts over students' uniforms was very practical. Albus hadn't given that any mind when the infractions were bandied about. He suggested, "With transfiguration, surely the uniform situation can be remedied?"

"Until the first _finite_ is cast," Severus replied. Dumbledore supposedly taught Transfiguration before McGonagall. Was there even transfiguration before _finite _was invented?

Albus frowned. It was true, but who would cast that randomly on someone? There were so many magical aids that one could have on their person that could be effected by _finite. _Reverting to his question, he repeated, "So there's nothing you need assistance with, Severus?"

"No." Why wouldn't this nutter let go of his arm, and go offend someone else with his outfit? What was the sudden realization that he was seventeen have to do with anything? Headmasters only treated minors poorly?

"If you're sure, though you know how to reach me, if you change your mind."

Lily had been enjoying herself talking to some graduated Gryffindors when Severus drifted into their group. He did not join their conversation, but stood silently. What was wrong now? Were Potter's parents following in their darling son's footsteps and spreading rumors that she was pregnant? The more she thought of Potter, the more things she remembered about what a constant toerag he was. The former Gryffindors brought him up in conversation too. They were surprised that after all this time he had been expelled. Potter had been bullying outnumbered or younger students since he first arrived.

In between, Lily edged next to Severus and lowly asked, "Alright, Sev?"

"We can stay as long as you like, Lily. I'm not trying to rush you."

"Is something wrong?"

"It can wait till tomorrow."

"Hmm," she responded, suspecting someone here bothered Severus. Besides the Potters … and Dumbledore, she added while looking at the people present. She had only exchanged a couple words earlier with the headmaster. It was unavoidable. At least Slughorn was not here, or multiple tiers of the wedding cake would have been inhaled. She smirked at the idea that Slughorn could come as Dumbledore's 'plus-one' to events, and between them shock the hostess by consuming their own weight in confections, and leaving hardly a crumb for other guests, while spouting meaningless drivel about some crackpot they exchanged recipes with in Timbuktu, Saskatchewan, or Constantinople.

Struck by a sudden thought that it could be some perception of Severus' regarding her, Lily asked, "Did you want to dance some more?" He had gotten angry at Petunia's wedding about the two of them not dancing together. Lily had danced with him earlier during several songs, but he may have liked it enough to want to do it more.

He shrugged. Lily could write these people if she wanted, but he did not mind her talking to them. This lot seemed mature, and unGryffindor-like. They were not speaking while stuffing themselves with food, spitting, scratching, or talking about quidditch, their own brilliant pranks and bravery, or bathroom functions. Severus had spent enough years observing the Marauders to know how normal Gryffindor males spent their days. Even his father's mates displayed better manners since they usually kept a hand on their pint, rather than in their ear, underarm, picking things out from between their bare toes or navel, or down the front or back of their trousers.

Lily interpreted Severus' shrug to imply he did, so grabbed his hand and led them to the dance floor. "Why do you think they don't have more dances at Hogwarts? It's been years since that one Valentine's Day dance."

"Too many fights."

Lily rolled her eyes. She had only been a third year, but the Gryffindor boys, especially the Marauders, carried on something awful like it was a life or death situation. Lily had gone with Mary and Helen. "I suppose with the Valentine theme, it was a bad idea. Wish there was something nice the school could do for all the students."

"Even if the school wanted to, their idea of nice is a lot different than the students."

"Yeah. The only thing they understand is food."

"Huh? You were at tea with me and ate a sugared butterfly wing."

"Oooh! How could you bring that up, Sev? You'll never let me forget it. Bleh."

"I was only rebutting your opinion regarding food."

"Thank goodness for the house elves."

Their discussion ceased during a faster song. Lily resumed it, when they went back to slow dancing. "Did someone bother you earlier?"

"Just Dumbledore."

"What's his problem now?"

"He has a sudden interest in helping students financially."

"You?"

"Yes, now that I'm seventeen. I don't know why he mentioned my age, and if that had anything to do with it."

"Why would he bother with that now? I mean you are going into your last year, and have all your textbooks from last year for your NEWT classes, except for whatever gets assigned for Defense."

"Just because he made an offer, doesn't mean he meant anything by it. I already told him that I had uniforms since the Marauders were no longer around to ruin them."

"Not just you, all those girls too. I bet they tailored that spell so half the buttons were banished. No one I talked to found all theirs."

"He didn't get that part since he thought everything could be transfigured from something else."

"Yeah, and when you cast one of your nasty _finite incantatem_s, then what?"

"Every girl within view and above the age of twelve would be topless."

Lily muttered, "Toerags." Then added, "Wait a minute. Earlier today when he had me cornered and asked what we were doing this summer, I told him we were working. He knew … well, not that you were set for life, but would have some galleons for your Defense text and parchment, quills and ink."

Shrugging, Severus replied, "I didn't take him seriously. I never heard of any assistance program for students. There's plenty of second hand texts and uniforms in use. Not just mine."

Lily doubted anyone's underwear could compare to Severus' old rags. She had to concede that it was Severus that defaced his books.

The strange thing about Lily's responses, in Severus' mind, was that she understood his annoyance at the old liar. True, Dumbledore was a common enemy since he interfered with Lily's desire to shag, but in the past, she had usually brought up the great things the codger had done. Winning a duel over thirty years ago against an evil wizard excused his behavior? What use was he now? It was obvious from He Who Must Not Be Named's strategy, he was not looking to have a one-on-one duel. His followers targeted people and their families, attacking during the night when everyone was asleep.

They continued dancing with breaks for Lily to enjoy some more champagne, and then they took their leave a short while after thousands of fairy lights were lit to fend off the encroaching darkness.

Lily was a bit giggly as they strolled towards the apparition point. Sometimes holding Sev's hand, and sometimes swinging her arms around him. Progress was slow, and when they stopped, Lily took the opportunity to bury her face against his chest. If only he had broad shoulders for her to hold, instead of this scrawny wireness.

"Behind your garden shed?" Severus asked.

"Hm? No. No. I want to go to your house."

"You aren't too tired?"

"Pfft, I've been waiting all day to be alone with you."

"Alright," he replied, and put his arms around Lily, in case she drunkenly tipped over. He apparated the two of them together to his back garden, next to the house so they did not have to walk anywhere in their dress robes.

Lily's hands slid down his body, even though they were still outside. He twisted his body away from that and opened the door. The kitchen still reminded him of his mother, no matter what color it was. The light color's difference was visible in the darkness due to all the windows. Although he did not use the back door when he was growing up because there was a sea of bottles to wade through, it was still the same. His hesitation allowed Lily to take advantage of Severus being a step above her to get her hand under his bum and touch his bollocks from behind. A dubious ability considering his dress robes hid everything.

"Wait till we are upstairs. I'll hang up your robes so they don't get ruined."

"My parents would appreciate that."

Severus did not reply to that flippant remark, and took Lily's hand to lead her up to his bedroom.

Lily's alcohol consumption was catching up with her, so Severus assisted with her clothing and took care to protect her dress robes, along with his own. He also cast a contraception charm on her.

Giddy due to the length of time since they had shagged, Lily luxuriated in being completely undressed and squirmed in anticipation while she impatiently waited for Sev to hang their robes properly. She continued to undulate her body against Severus when he joined her, and their mouths and hands got reacquainted with the rest of their lover's flesh, including rubbing their feet against each other's and up their ankles and legs.

"I need you, Sev," Lily urged, when Severus was taking too long in her opinion.

He had been enjoying the sensation of flesh on flesh for the entire length of his body in the almost complete darkness since the street light nearby was either burnt out, or something with the mechanical timer was off and it was lighting during the day again. Not ready to change positions, Severus pulled Lily's upper thigh over his and was able to penetrate her while they lay on their sides, facing each other.

Lily stiffened and gasped before rocking against Sev for more. Even though it seemed kind of lazy positioning, it felt bloody bang-up.

Severus was lulled into thinking he was more than adequate since Lily occasionally had involuntary muscle stiffening along with holding her breath, besides the changes in her gasps and groans in between, while still trying to snog. All the signs were there that Lily was enjoying their slow love making, however with her good was not good enough.

"Can we roll over so you can get deeper, Sev?"

He felt more than enough of him was sliding into Lily. It was his cock after all, and he was acutely aware of what was going on with it. Rather than entering into a discussion, Severus acquiesced by rolling into Lily so she was on her back, and had to break things off momentarily to get in a kneeling position, before lifting both her legs in an upright 'V' to resume.

Lily purred, "Yeah," before descending into the grunts that Severus craved, but still could not explain why he enjoyed hearing them. He remained focused due to them, rather than having stray thoughts about Hogwarts, the headmaster, Potter's parents, Potter or Black, so it was not long before a shock ran up his spine, arching his shoulders back while making his muscles rigid, except for his calves and feet which twitched as his breathing elongated into one long, open-mouthed inhale.

As he exhaled and his body went limp, Lily murmured, "Mmmm, Sev."

His eyelids fluttered as he contemplated she was already looking forward to a second time this evening. Severus stretched out beside Lily, the two of them resuming their side-by-side position with some caresses of each other's body with both hands and feet.

That was brilliant. If only Lily could get this at least once a day. This would be perfect just before going to sleep. Sev's bed was too narrow for sleeping, and of course, she was expected home sometime tonight. It would also keep her from staying mad at Sev. Her face scrunched in thought, had she been angry with him? Today, he was very nice to her. If he hexed Potter's parents, it was discrete. There was that stupid gift, but that was nothing worth getting upset over. There was still that money. He was keeping a secret from her. Lily doubted it was stolen, but some sort of deal must have been made. It would be alright if it was something about making Potter, Black or Lupin pay. Why didn't Severus trust her to turn against Gryffindors, though were they still if they were all expelled? Anyway, they did wrong … against other Gryffindors. Didn't need to be a Slytherin to want revenge, though it would be better if it was called justice.

Severus was letting out another long sigh of contentment while he enjoying Lily's company, when she asked, "Sev?"

"Hmm?"

"Was that money from Wilkes or Rosier?"

Trusting the lack of light, Severus lip curled up in a sneer. Unbelievable. What was Lily's problem? "I won't tell you."

"Will they?"

"Maybe they'll think you are ungrateful and want more."

"No, but shouldn't I thank whoever?"

"Not if they don't want thanks." If he told her was from him, there would be no thanks. Severus could not please Lily either way. She was either complaining about not receiving money, or whining that she needed to account for every coin.

"Does it have something to do with how Slytherins are supposed to act? I mean, they still like Mary and me, right?"

"I don't feel like talking about them right now," Severus complained.

"Why not?"

"I was hoping to enjoy some quiet time with you, Lily, but we might as well get dressed, if you are finished with me."

"Finished?"

"You got what you wanted, didn't you?"

"Well, didn't you?" she asked, and at the same time grabbed his cock.

"I do not set the same criteria as you, Lily."

"What are you talking about?"

He emitted a loud exhalation before explaining, "I've told you, I enjoy being alone with you, but doing nothing in particular. Love making is nice ..."

"Nice?"

"It's part of what I want. For you, it seems to be everything. When you're done, that's it."

"What do you mean that's it? We do a lot of things together, Sev."

"Physically together, yes. Intellectually, we have homework, but the deeper connection is suffering."

"What deeper connection?"

"I've told you that I have feelings for you, Lily. Like a hunger, it needs to be fed, or I can't see the point."

"What point? I'm your best friend, Sev, and we do a lot of great things together."

"I'm unhappy."

"That's not my fault … I mean there's a lot going on so it's normal for you to be unhappy, but I'm here to support you, not the cause of it. You're being irrational due to all that."

What??? Gryffindors were so remarkably dense. That's probably why Slytherin left the school so long ago. Didn't have to keep anything secret, just tell a Gryffindor something they did not want to hear. Godric Gryffindor could have been told about the legendary secret chamber numerous times and even offered a tour by Slytherin himself.

Severus took a deep breath and then lay next to Lily quietly. Now that he had attempted to tell her that things were not fine between them, Lily had forewarning if he told her at the end of the summer that he … what? He did not want to be her friend? Maybe not that drastic, but the extra things would have to stop. He'd wait till they went back to school, so Lily could go back to hanging on MacDonald's every word. The two of them could go back to doing whatever they used to do without him.

Lily' face screwed up in thought. Her mum had told her that things were not right with Severus. She had plenty of theories regarding Sev's parents and their deaths, and then their little white lie about Lily being cursed. To Lily, Severus seemed alright. But here again, he was admitting something to her. That was odd. Touching that he'd tell her, but still unusual for Severus. He was a bit crazy back when his mum died, but he was hardly sleeping back then. She thought he was resting better now, but wouldn't know for sure until they were at this upcoming job. She could keep an eye on him better. Right now, he kept leaving her house to go do things. Lily wanted to leave her house to go do things too. If this place wasn't such a crap shack, she might make good on her threat to her mother and move in here. There was no way Lily wanted to live somewhere without proper facilities.


	43. Chapter 43 Working for the Man

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 43 Working for the Man

During their break from Charms homework, Severus' opinion of their employer's request was quite evident to Lily. Rather than starting their first day of work by arriving Monday morning, Regulus Moonshine requested the two of them arrive Sunday afternoon 'to settle in'. Severus didn't like it. If they are paid to work Monday through Friday, what they did on Sunday was up to them. What if this fellow expected them there every Sunday for the next several weeks, now that a precedent was going to be established?

After listening to Severus, Lily replied, "Well, maybe he has something he wants us to get right on Monday. Eager for us to start so he doesn't want to waste time explaining rules and whatever."

"Rules?" Severus repeated. "Although we'll be living on his land, and working for him, we're only there for a short while so we won't get so comfortable that we're doing … who knows what."

"Well, we wouldn't, but some students aren't as mature as us."

Severus made a face. Was Lily talking about shagging? Immature people shagged too.

"What?" she asked.

"Nothing. You have put his request in a positive light so I will not quill a nasty reply, but return our acceptance."

Lily was momentarily rendered speechless. There was no more discussion? No more what-ifs from Severus to get her wound up? Maybe he was feeling a bit off and under the weather emotionally. "So we'll have an extra evening there," she replied suggestively with a couple eyebrow raises to indicate what she meant.

"With all the studying we did for our Hogwarts expedition to make stone floors comfy, we should be alright. I also know pest repelling charms."

"Good," Lily agreed. Severus was practical, and being covered with mosquito and gnat bites was not mood-enhancing.

"If the weather is fair, Phi will be comfortable out of doors. When she's cooped up, she gets noisy."

"Are you packing anything special?"

"Like what?"

"Uh … I don't know. I could bring my bathing suit, but you never wear one?"

"No, however I can watch you go swimming. Though no swimming areas were mentioned in the letters."

"What about your radio?"

"It's not good looking. I put together a wireless with a muggle tuner."

"What?"

"My house isn't wired to power things."

"There's batteries."

"Aren't there dangerous chemicals in those?"

"They only leak when they aren't new anymore."

"I'd rather stick to the wizarding wireless getting muggle music."

"You prefer muggle music?"

"There's only one wizarding station up this way, and I don't have an ear for most of their selections, and during the day they talk about food. I heard London has three stations. Besides wizards setting up their own transmitters to broadcast whatever they feel like, until the Ministry gets a complaint."

"Like what?"

Severus shrugged. Crackpots could recite poems to their kneazles for all he cared.

Hm, Severus was now conversing normally. Maybe something was making him moody? Lily had been dwelling on her friend stating he was unhappy. This job was an unknown, but he had steadfastly stood by sacrificing six weeks of his holiday to better his chance at a recommendation for an apprenticeship. After six years of Hogwarts, they could take anything for six weeks, especially since they'd be together.

"So I'll let mum know. Did he give a time? Maybe you could have dinner here."

"Just afternoon … that's before dinner time?"

Lily sighed. She did not want to miss Sunday dinner at home. It was always delicious.

Seeing Lily's displeasure, Severus asked, "Would it be inconvenient to serve it a little earlier, and then I will respond back with a letter stating our arrival time will be two hours after that? It's summer so it's light enough to see anything he wants to show us outside."

"Yeah, like our teepee."

"What? I've heard you call bog paper T.P."

"Oh, yeah, I got that from an American show on the telly. No, I mean the things their indians live in."

"India? I don't know what you're talking about, Lily."

"With no television and not attending school, you've missed out on a lot, Severus."

"No, I haven't. I find out what I want to know. I charmed a notepad to give me the highlights for football games so I don't need to go somewhere to watch them."

"Football?" Lily asked in puzzlement.

Severus nodded, "Manchester United. That's the best team."

"I've heard of them," Lily agreed, hoping this was not going to turn into Severus' version of a quidditch obsession.

"So knowing the final score, who scored and assisted, penalties and the other facts, I don't need to take the time to go to the pub to see the game. It's quicker, and my clothes don't end up getting smelly."

"Wouldn't you rather see it?" Lily was trying to understand. The only quidditch she paid attention to was the school games, when Gryffindor played. She enjoyed sitting in the stands with the other Gryffindors, rather than doing something else and being told after the game who won and who scored.

Severus looked thoughtful, then said, "I suppose it would be convenient if I had my own television to watch a match, when I didn't have something else to do. And my father's mates still book motor coaches and get a block of tickets for the important games. That would take most of a day for me to do that, besides paying for my ticket and share of the transportation."

Lily felt a bit thick. Of course, Severus' father. It wasn't some fancy of Severus' to like a football team. "You'd go with them on the bus?"

"Why wouldn't I?"

"You could apparate."

"Oh. I could go alone." He paused, then added, "I'd rather not go alone."

That was crazy talk. Why would Severus rather be with his father's drunken, loud-mouthed lot? Was he that sad? Maybe daydream about liking his father and going with him somewhere nice … or a football match? Severus really had no clue about all the fun things there were to do. He probably heard all sorts of extravagances in Slytherin house, but his life centered around Spinner's End or Hogwarts. He didn't even bother going to Hogsmeade till Lily made him. She supposed that could be partially her fault, since he just said he'd rather not do things alone. Lily went with Mary and Helen. She didn't even think about what Severus did on those weekends because she assumed every student third year and older was there. It certainly seemed like it whenever she tried to shoulder her way into Honeydukes, or tried to find a table at the Three Broomsticks.

Severus changed the subject since he knew Lily did not like football, "I'm going to London before tomorrow afternoon. Did you need anything?"

"No … wait, did you get the portkey information for late August?"

"The Ministry said the schedule is not final. That office seems a bit scatterbrained, and suggested waiting lists for unusual destinations. I was intrigued by 'unusual' so asked to see a list to see if something exciting was on it. They claim not to have one, nor are they allowed to tell me any details about the waiting lists like if any need two more people for August for them to schedule a regular portkey. That's probably how they make their fees for their portkey service."

"I have money if we want to book our own portkey."

"I do too, but that's not the point. We aren't too particular about where or even the exact day or time."

"Maybe we should go someplace ridiculous."

Severus' eyebrows lifted. "Why don't we see how ridiculous our accommodations are at Moonshine's first?"

"Our one look at Mould-on-the-Wold was pretty boring. I want some excitement to look forward to."

"Ridiculous and excitement are not the same thing, Lily."

"I want something fantastic so when we get back to school no one will believe that you and I went there."

"That should not be the primary reason to pick a destination."

"Well, what do we want? One – I agree with speaking English. I'm not in the mood to be misunderstood and confused. Two – I want good food. Three – I want to see things that I can't see around here."

"There's a lot that's not around here. For food, do you mean a regional cuisine, or lots of quantity and variety?"

"Hm, I'm not sure. I do like steaks … you know that already, Sev."

"That's fine."

"You know what? I'm going to look at muggle vacation spots. That might lead to something better than the Ministry."

"If you want. I'm not particular that it has to be wizarding or muggle. Do we need something to travel as muggles?"

"Can't they fix up a portkey for where we want?"

"If we pay for it, and I'll ask again about paperwork for international travel, if we are going into muggle areas."

"Can't we fake it?"

"We have time to prepare properly and legally, Lily. Unless your idea of adventure is foreign constables and their version of the Ministry of Magic."

Lily made a disapproving noise. There could be an element of fun, but at heart, she did not like being trouble. "So before we get back to arguing over this Charm again, let me ask mum about dinner tomorrow to get you a time."

Severus had all his letters written by later that day so took them all with him to Diagon Alley to post. He was not thrilled to have so many correspondents. The only interesting correspondent he had was Lovegood. His solicitor did get him information so he had posed a new question to be answered, for a fee. Of course, he had to word it in a roundabout manner, and anyone that knew him would see it for a blatant lie. He did not in any way admire Albus Dumbledore's clothing, but he did realize that even taste that bad was an expensive habit. As a young man with limitless career potential, was an educator's or headmaster's salary so generous, or did Dumbledore have other sources of income? If one of those businesses could be learned and duplicated, Severus did have the capital to start his own venture. This was not about friendly competition and proving he could be better, in fact, it would be better for Severus if he could undermine any of the irresponsible coot's without having to establish a rival business of his own that needed to be built up over years.

**************************************

Albus paced around his office. He was disappointed. He did not put a lot of stock in Divination since so much was vague, open to being forced into interpretation that was incorrect, or some was just plain made up.

The predictions for Severus Snape, Albus could have written himself, based on all the thought he had given the matter. It was annoying to not have anything new, and Augury confirming everything he concluded.

The bad far outweighed the good, but if Albus was reading this correctly, a sort of scale was tipping slowly towards Severus' favor. Augury had been thorough and put things in perspective starting with how he read the youthful phase full of hardship and setbacks. In plainer language, it would sound like one of Upsilon's sagas of someone from lowly beginnings with everything pitted against them emerging as a finely forged being.

This was still the formative stage with many factors still pitted against Severus. Albus had been aware of them, but private worry and someone else writing it were different.

Why was there any link between Tom and Severus? Especially while he was still a student? Severus' accomplishments at the school were not so phenomenal to attract that sort of attention … unless it was something only known among the Slytherins. Whatever occurred was prior to this year with the dragonpox, the werewolf, and targeting the boy's father. Was Tom persistent due to some perceived importance regarding Severus, or just the idea that a teenager did not oblige him by dying? Did Horace know the cause, and neglect to volunteer any information since he had other students to promote?

After hours of searching in the pensieve, Albus concluded that not even Abstractus had mentioned Severus until this year. When he submitted that massive tome of arithmatic, hypothetical potion substitutions. Prior to that, any faculty member only mentioned Severus negatively in connection with the Gryffindor boys in his year.

Inspiration struck, and then he was frowning at himself. He should visit Remus Lupin, and he should have thought of it before now. Not in association with asking about Severus, but due to the circumstances for which he was imprisoned. As a young philosopher said, the headmaster was culpable for what happens at the school.

**************************************

With trepidation, Lily mentioned to her mother, "Mum, Severus told me he was unhappy when we were leaving that wedding the other day. He sort of blamed me."

Her mother did not answer immediately as she studied her daughter. Before blurting out the way she saw things, she asked to clarify, "Just that Severus is unhappy, or about something in particular?"

"He was talking about us and said he was unhappy, but I know it's not me because all this stuff is happening to him. We both got dragonpox, then the werewolf, then I couldn't come home for Christmas, and his father getting murdered, and the headmaster not caring enough to tell Severus so then his mum died too, when Sev should have been home to help her. And the headmaster being a real pain in the ass ever since then, and even annoyed Severus at the wedding reception by being all two-faced."

"What does you staying at the school for Christmas have to do with Severus? Wasn't he happy you stayed with him?"

"Oh, yeah, he was. Sorry, I was thinking about the differences in the past school year. I guess that was a highlight actually."

"Well, we could start there. Besides all the homework I've seen you do in previous years, what did you do besides that over the holiday?"

Lily groaned, "I forgot about that. The headmaster was a real toerag then too. We went to the Christmas feast, where the faculty and students that stayed behind just sit at one big table and stuff themselves. I had wanted to go to it, and it wasn't till later that I realized that Severus may never have gone to one in all the Christmases he had been there. I'm not sure if it's due to one teacher telling us that they preferred the students to stay out of sight and get their meals from the kitchen directly, or if he knew that there was something about the food or company he wouldn't like. He didn't even know what a cracker, the one with the prize inside, was. The feast was horrible but Severus snuck out early to go to detention."

"On Christmas?"

"Severus doesn't belong in detention at all. It's only because he wouldn't strip off his clothes for Madam Pomfrey."

"Madam? A woman?"

"She's the school nurse, but she hates Severus. We had gone to visit Mary in the Infirmary because she stays there during the day when its the full moon. She's too weak then to get out of bed. Well, we're there, visiting, being quiet and respectful, even though Mary's the only patient in there, and out of nowhere, Pomfrey pops out of her office and demands that she be allowed to physically examine Severus, and when she told him to take off his clothes, he told her 'no'."

"Severus is not well cared for. She may have been trying to help him."

"It was only a couple months after we got out of hospital, and we were getting a weekly check-up by those healers for a while. One of them sorted Severus after he had scalding liquid poured on him in Potions because Madam Pomfrey couldn't be bothered. A prefect even walked him to the Infirmary, and he was angrier than Severus. If she wanted to see Severus' skin, that was the time to take an interest."

"That mark on his elbow is large."

"That's not from then. These were on his chest and stomach. He also got set on fire that morning too. Stupid toerags and their magic turns some of them inhumane. Severus always gets the worst of it. Stripping off his clothes, set on fire, scalds, stabbed, knocked down stairs, his head beaten against stone walls and floors, cleaning charms so foam comes out of his mouth or rubs his skin raw. Same jokers also attack smaller boys in the loos, and were the ones stripped off girls' blouses and pulling up their skirts. That's why I didn't take any chances when one showed up on our porch, mum, and dragged you with me over to Severus' to keep you safe."

"Is that behavior normal?"

"No, it's just that they're wealthy gits. The one that was here was expelled. One of his mates is in prison. Another is exiled from Britain. And the last one got himself killed somehow, but he was always out of bounds at school so they never figured out what happened to him. Probably all before they were seventeen. They were treated like pampered princes at school till they killed Helen.

"The parents of the one that was lingering on our porch were at the wedding and we got into exchanging words until one of the our professors showed up. They think the sun shines out of their little Jamie's arse."

"Lily."

"Well, they do. Can't admit he screwed up, they're bragging about him making it onto the reserve of a professional sports team."

"He did not appear athletic to me."

"At Hogwarts, he was on the team because he had the most expensive broom."

"Do you think Severus is upset over this other young man?"

"I'm not sure how much he thinks about him. Obviously, with his proud parents shooting their mouths off, it crosses his mind."

"Only child?"

"I think so."

"Undoubtedly that's why they need to make the best of things. Severus should not worry about that. Not getting expelled is preferable. Look at how many young athletes have nothing to fall back on when they get injured, or realize they aren't cut out for that life."

"Why worry about education and having something to fall back on when they're born into unreasonable amounts of wealth?"

"That sort of thing is minor. They'll be people like that all the time, even if they don't really have money, class or breeding. Seeing and hearing them may have simply brought some of Severus' feelings to the surface. The two of you went to a wedding anticipating having a lovely time, and they ruin your afternoon. A minor thing like that may have triggered other things that Severus has been mulling over."

"Maybe."

"Ask Severus more questions about how he feels about things. I'm not around you all the time, but I have heard you make decisions for both of you without discussing it with him first."

Lily tutted, "Not on important things. And Sev has his secrets. He does stuff at the bank, and has a solicitor doing paperwork for him."

"What's wrong with that?"

"He won't tell me much about it … like how much life insurance he received, he only says it's enough. And he said the paperwork was about handling his parents' affairs, but what did they have?"

"I assume they did not rent their house so there is some property, Lily. Besides, why do you need to know?"

"I'm upset that all his books are gone."

"Your father made an offer to help Severus keep them, and was declined. It's not our business what he does with his belongings."

"He didn't let me help him go through them, and what if he didn't get a fair price?"

"Lily, why are you so worried about Severus' money? I know you've said you two have talked about things … but if you have no confidence in Severus just because he has not had money in the past, perhaps you should consider he'd be more cautious with it, rather than frittering it away."

"He is still interested in doing some sort of vacation in late August; it's dependent on our homework. We've gotten a lot done already."

"Has Severus given any indication as to what he'd like to do?"

"He's disappointed with the portkey office. They arrange large things, but their scheduled service for a couple people seems haphazard. Not like an airplane or a travel agent. I told him I could go to the library or something. For our first trip, the only thing we agreed on was somewhere where a form of English was commonly spoken. The languages Severus studies aren't common … well, he can probably understand Greek."

"Greece could be lovely."

"Severus wanted to see old stuff there. I thought maybe he could start with British museums."

"With you?"

"Uh, I guess. Museums aren't really my thing, mum. I like some history, and museums have their value, but hours of looking at things? Perhaps if Severus had a mission to look at something specific, then we'd have time to eat and maybe do something else."

"You should try to compromise, Lily. Even if you only think of Severus as your very close friend, and aren't seriously considering what you've discussed, it's alright to be concerned about how he feels. You need to ask him directly, at times. Don't be a pest. Also, don't pester him about things like money, or if the two of you are seeing other people, keep it polite."

"What other people?"

"Like other people. Until recently, I had no idea that you and Severus were more than you know … best mates. I mean I know you are a girl and he's a boy, but he's … I don't know, I was thinking more brotherly. Perhaps because Petunia teased him so much at the beginning. Besides the two of you being young when you met."

"Why wouldn't he keep it polite? I mean I've told him that once I do my apprenticeship and get established, I'll meet wizards who catch my fancy and get married. It's not going to be a surprise. Half the students at Hogwarts are scoping each other out as potential spouses. The pool of wizards and witches in Britain is small enough that chances are good they'll marry someone they went to school with."

"And Severus?"

"Severus? Right now, he's still got those marks from that terrible case of dragonpox. It'll get better. I'm doubting his will go away entirely, but he's brilliant. Some Ravenclaw girl will fall in love with him over some arithmancy equation. Mary thinks she fancies him, but it's for all the wrong reasons. I've tried to tell her."

"What sort of wrong reasons? Is she interested solely because Severus is your friend?"

"She wouldn't have even looked at Severus, if he wasn't around me. No, it's when there was a chance I might be infected and turn into a werewolf, Severus was worried about everything. Where I would be at school, if I'd stay in school, what would happen when I was home here since there's limited resources in a muggle house, and all that sort of thing so that's why Mary wants him to take care of her. He even had some ideas about children. Werewolves supposedly can't have them or something, I did not get around to reading that, but with Mary, it's an accepted fact. I was upset over that, but Severus kind of brushed that aside with some ideas to help me once we knew at what stage the infection was. If it was just female werewolves could not be pregnant due to the transformation, then there's a way to remove an egg from me, fertilize and grow it in another body. The second was a little wild. He thought that if the eggs themselves were infected, that a similar one could be used … hold it, mum, would you believe Sev suggested Petunia?"

"What's wrong with that idea? You are sisters."

"We're nothing alike."

"If Severus could see a similarity between the two of you, than you should believe him."

"It was all crazy talk, mum," Lily disagreed. "Sev said if it was the two of us, he wouldn't mind our baby in his body. I mean that's just plain weird."

"Although I have trouble comprehending that, Lily, I am glad that Severus thinks of solutions. Not everyone is fortunate to easily have children. It tears couples apart, especially when blame is assigned haphazardly. There's a whole range of difficulties ..."

"You watch too much telly, mum."

"I do not. It happens in real life too."

Lily rolled her eyes, and her mother added, "Perhaps you need to talk to Severus more about why he said he was unhappy. He may have changed his mind once he was away from those people."

"Maybe this job will keep us so busy, he won't have time to think. I think that's the problem with him. He can stay awake all night thinking. Sev barely slept after his mum died. So if something's really wrong, he may not sleep. I'll try to figure that out while we're at this fellow's house."

"And no breaking the rules either. What applies here, applies there, Lily."

"Mum, we're seventeen." Lily had not told her mother that she'd be sharing a room, or shed, or tent with Severus.

"I don't care if you're seventy."

**************************************

It was always worse than he remembered it. Albus Dumbledore hated going to Azkaban. Plain and simple. It was a miserable place, and did nothing to reform wizards. Overwhelming guilt and self-doubt had its uses, but constant assault on the mind by dementors left one changed, and not for the better.

He was torn over the case of Remus Lupin. There were laws … good laws … to enforce that a werewolf had to take more than reasonable care to prevent their transformed lycanthropes meeting non-infected persons. Lupin had attacked others, infected one and killed another. Using the defense that he was not in his right mind was not a valid legal defense because he knew beforehand that he was a werewolf.

With regards to his accessibility and not being supervised, that was Albus' fault. However, when Lupin knew that others found out that he was a werewolf and could use him for illegal activities, it was his duty to report it. He knew he was dangerous, and why, after all his own personal suffering, would he risk infecting or killing someone else? That's what confounded Albus most. Lupin knew his friends were reckless, and might try to 'play' with the werewolf. Gryffindors did the most foolhardy things. Had Lupin no thoughts about his friends, or did he desire one of them to keep him company during the full moon when they accidentally got infected?

Conversation with Lupin was stilted. The young man was hopeful regarding James Potter's endeavor to have a pardon granted. Albus saw he did truly regret what had occurred.

Eventually, Albus steered the conversation to the subject that brought him here. "I had been reminiscing about the days when the four of you were in school together. You and Potter, along with Pettigrew and Black. I feel I should have seen something … some sign that you boys were heading down the wrong path. I intervened enough times with Prof. McGonagall to think that the four of you would trust me. Perhaps come to me with a problem that was too big for you to handle alone."

Remus nodded, then commented, "I guess we were caught up in our overconfidence. We were having fun."

"Was there a point among yourselves that you noticed that your direction was more towards hurting others, rather than just fun? Was there a incident that pushed your activities in that direction … perhaps with Mr. Snape?"

"Snape? Um, well, he fights back, and he can make it challenging at times. I know sometimes we'd catch him unawares and go too far. We almost drowned him in a commode in the gents'. Other times it spilled over to other Slytherins. Since Sirius and James were brilliant with transfiguration, they could change the food on the Slytherin table from our side of the Great Hall. It wasn't poison or anything like that. It didn't bother Snape so much, but they got a kick out of other Slytherins' reactions."

"Did there come a time when you worried it may become poison to make things more exciting?"

"I don't think they'd do that."

"Are you saying that because you might incriminate yourself, or are you trying to protect your friends, Mr. Lupin?"

"Nothing like that … sir, I'm just saying they wouldn't risk killing someone."

"But they did."

"Uh, well, I'm hoping that that was all a big mistake. Sirius does not think the whole thing through before he begins something."

"I do not think you are being entirely truthful, Remus. With your appeal coming before the Wizengamot, I think anything you could do to unburden yourself of the secrets you've kept till now, would be best."

"Secrets?"

"Between you and the other lads."

"James already told me that he registered his animagus form, and Peter probably died in an accident when someone saw him as a rat. Sirius well … he's an animagus too, but he's no longer living here."

"Three animagus? Who's idea was it and who led?"

"Um, I know it wasn't Peter. And definitely not me. Either James or Sirius knew that werewolves did not attack animals or animagus in their form, so that's what led them to start studying how to do it."

"Did either one of them learn it very quickly?"

"No, I mean it was over a year before they got anywhere, and Peter was the last to achieve it."

"I'm in something of a quandary, Remus, and you may know something that you don't realize. Can we talk some more about Mr. Snape? What started the rivalry?"

"Oh, well … I think Sirius and James ran into him on the train. I was in a different compartment, but Evans and Snape were sitting with Sirius and James, and then something got said, and Evans and Snape moved compartments. Since then, James fancied Evans and they both wanted to get the better of Snape."

"How did they involve you in it, or did Mr. Snape target you also? I know he's not an entirely innocent, rule-abiding student."

"It was more like being part of the group. With Snape being into the Dark Arts, it was an easy choice."

"What Dark Arts have you seen him use?"

"I haven't seen him use any. He knows a lot of spells, but he's always reading. Sirius recognized the books. There's a lot of them at his house."

"Do you know any titles?"

"No, I mean … they're blank on the outside without a picture. Not best sellers. They're either dark or black hard cover books."

"So if I am understanding you, it was based on Sirius Black's knowledge of what Dark Arts tomes look like that the four of you began attacking Severus Snape in first year?"

"Not just that … I mean Snape's good with verbal insults, and if he ... I don't know, chickened out or cried or something, it wouldn't have been fun. That was the main reason I think, the consistant entertainment value he provided."

"Than your understanding is that truly hurting him would put an end to a juvenile pastime? Rather than hurting him permanently would make the group of you the victors?"

"We crossed the line, and so did Snape, but none of us were looking to put an end to the other. Snape could have picked me or Peter off at any time, and he spent enough time watching and thinking to probably get James or Sirius, if he wanted to. He'd restrict it to a stinging hex or something similar when he caught one of us off guard."

"Let me share my suspicions with you, Remus. Over the past year, I noticed at least three attempts on Severus' life. One of them included you. I believe the information Sirius gave Severus was to lure him to you alone at an ideal time, however since he also gave Mr. Snape a concussion, the information was not received properly.

"Prior to that, a rare Dark Arts spell was employed against him, along with Miss Evans, who was in close proximity to him. She was one factor in uncovering the plot, along with one of my faculty studying such phenomena as a hobby.

"I also suspect Mr. Pettigrew was involved in the third attempt, but since that was on the evening he disappeared, I'm not certain if he laid the trap for Mr. Snape, or he led someone else to the ideal location.

"Lastly, is the most disturbing evidence that something is afoot. Since Mr. Snape's father is a muggle, he lives in a muggle town. Just him and Miss Evans, with no wizards for miles. No floos, no owls, no local reporter for The Daily Prophet, so why would Death Eaters choose a pub his father frequents to have their sport? The same pub Messrs. Potter, Black and Pettigrew caused trouble in last summer. My thought is it was to lure Severus home, away from Hogwarts, but like the other attempts, it was badly botched.

"You were already in Azkaban when that occurred, but do you know what occurred last summer and how it could relate? Who's idea was it to visit the quaint muggle town where Mr. Snape and Miss Evans dwell? I doubt either one issued an invitation."

Remus groaned and muttered, "I told them it was a bad idea. After we got in trouble for the girls' blouses, which I still say we never did, they were hot over the probation and James getting banned from quidditch. It wasn't Snape's fault, but when they need someone to blame, there's always some way they can connect him back to the incident.

"So we finished our OWLs, were on the train, still talking about the perceived injustice of it all, and we get off the train, and there's Snape, and he's going to board a muggle train with who got mistaken as his sister, but it was really Evans' sister, but we'll come back to her. So Peter changed and followed to find out where they bought a ticket to."

"Was it Peter's idea?"

"I don't think so. We had all been talking about how it was inconvenient we did not know where Snape lived because we wouldn't be able to do something till September, unless we sent him mail."

"You all knew he does not have a wizard and witch as parents? I think Prof. McGonagall has mentioned the prejudice your group showed Mr. Snape and would make inappropriate, public statements regarding he deserved the treatment he received because that's all he exists for?"

"Yeah, I know what you're talking about. It's not that he's a half-blood at all, it's just that James and Sirius can't stand him so they said some pretty crazy things. It's hard to explain, they'd get caught up in the moment, and the crowd cheering them, and someone might object so they'd say that Snape deserved it and threaten them with the same treatment if they didn't shut up. It's one of those things the dementors like to use so I've given it some thought."

"Alright, so knowing that the destination may be muggle, especially since he switched to the muggle transportation, the plan was to go there and do what?"

"I'm not sure what the final idea was, or how they ended up in that pub. I do know there was a problem because they found Evans' sister, but thinking she was Snape's, Sirius may have said some inappropriate things, and then James was mad at him because he fancies Evans."

"Yes, I think Miss Evans said that Mr. Black threatened her sister. She's still upset, and Mr. Potter only recently visited her home to try to speak to her so she's concerned that wizards, other than Mr. Snape, intend to show up and bully muggles whenever the mood strikes them."

"Peter said something about the secrecy act when he was stewing over how the plan went wrong. That they were going to cause trouble, and then Snape as the only underaged wizard in the area, would take the blame because they planned to exit quickly using the Knight Bus.

"I doubt that was true because Evans lives around there too, and James would not want Evans in any trouble."

"He did get into trouble, but Mr. Snape confessed that his father had requested that he attempt to repair the damage caused by your friends. That is underaged magic. However, there's only so much he could do on his own, so he did do the right thing by getting in contact with the Ministry through Miss Evans."

It did cross Remus' mind that his friends claimed that Snape had destroyed the pub, rather than them, but the Marauders always had a poor policy of being truthful, even privately among themselves. It was just one more shameful event in the Marauders' brief history. Remus spent a lot of time wishing that he could do it all over, while he whiled away the days and weeks in Azkaban.

"I'm sure you understand my search for a definitive connection then?"

"Connection?"

"Yes, between the Marauders and the Death Eaters. Starting with the failed excursion by your friends, that is when things changed. They were outwitted by muggles because one recognized magic. Who knows where their plans would have led them after they left there? Perhaps they would have found Mr. Snape's residence and treated it in a similar fashion."

Remus frowned in thought. He was not sure if they would have done something to another student's house. Wouldn't Snape's mother stop them?

As if sensing Remus' thoughts, Albus continued, "Mrs. Snape, although a witch, was ill for many years so they would have found it easy enough to wreak havoc, along with whatever collateral damage happened to their muggle neighbors' homes.

"Failing to accomplish whatever they set out to do during that trip, the next plan was put into motion, almost killing Mr. Snape and making Miss Evans quite ill. If the two of them were not so close, he would have suffered alone, and probably it would have remained undetectable, as I said earlier.

"When Mr. Snape recovers enough to return to school, Mr. Black assaults him and somehow accidentally mentions in passing that you are not at home during the full moon. Mr. Snape is unwell, injured, and passes the information along to his friends during conversation, and we all know how that ended up.

"During an unsupervised detention, a large masonry block falls almost crushing Mr. Snape and a Ravenclaw prefect. That is the evening Mr. Pettigrew disappeared and although his death was reported, his body was never recovered.

"That takes me up to Death Eaters attacking his father. A muggle. A nobody in the middle of nowhere, as far as they're concerned. Due to an unusual chain of events, Severus does not go home at the appropriate time. So if there was a plan for the same Death Eaters to finish whatever they started in that pub, it would fail because they too were overcome by muggles, or if others were waiting for Mr. Snape, he did not arrive when and where he was expected."

Remus understood what the headmaster was saying, but had to ask, "Why Severus Snape? He's a student, and from what I heard all the Slytherins are joining up with He Who Must Not Be Named so why go through any trouble to kill him? And we don't have anything to do with him."

"I think you may have, through Sirius Black. His cousin was one of those Death Eaters. Along with her husband and brother-in-law. His father was suspected of being in Voldemort's inner circle. After this failure, he was found dead in Knockturn Alley. It's obvious Sirius has connections. He was out of jail and Britain itself within a day of Parkin meeting her end."

"No, Sirius hates all that."

"If it's one thing I learned is that Sirius Black could tell a convincing tale, and certainly he could express outrage when any version of the truth, other than his own, was presented. I'm only wondering at what point did he really tell you and the others the truth? Was there always some plan against Severus Snape, or was it some crazy fancy of his that took hold of him and escalated it into something deadly?"

"I understand what you are saying, professor, but that has nothing to do with us. Uh, me and the Shrieking Shack was only a coincidence. Not part of some overall plot. I don't think there is any, really. Snape's smart, but he's not … oh, I don't know, a genius?"

Making light of the assessment, he replied, "At least you give Mr. Snape more credit than Prof. Slughorn."

"Well, that was a class where a lot could go on … I was in Runes with Snape. I hadn't given him any attention till last year because I was constantly struggling with it. But I saw that Snape really understood what was going on."

"Prof. Upsilon is fond of Severus. It was not until recently that I was aware of some of the staff's feelings regarding him. His article in The Quibbler, then his research in The Practical Potioneer … usually one is not as accomplished to appear in both publications."

"I remember the Unforgivables article," Remus replied wistfully. It had been when the four of them were together in their dorm. Then he remembered Sirius' attitude towards Unforgivables. It was a carefree attitude that did not consider others. Not a plot to target anyone specifically, except they were bound to hate anything written when it was authored by Snape.

After his conversation with Dumbledore, Remus Lupin lay in his cell wondering if the headmaster only visited him to talk about Severus Snape. Damned dementors were driving him crazy. That just came up in conversation. Dumbledore was concerned about him languishing in prison. Only natural since they had been somewhat close before. Remus was sure of it since he went through all that trouble to allow him to attend Hogwarts.

****************************

When Severus arrived at her home for Sunday dinner, Lily blurted out, "Where'd you get those?"

"You told me to get new clothes."

"Um, yeah I did, but you picked those out yourself?"

"What's wrong with them?"

Lily had not meant for Severus to buy new clothes that were similar to his old clothes. The trousers and jumper fit so it was a big improvement, along with not being older than the person wearing them. No real color either. His jumper was a grey blue, and the trousers were dark charcol. "Uh, I'm sort of surprised that you didn't choose something different since your other clothes are hand me down."

"I can't wear robes in Spinner's End or over here, Lily. This style is fine. Students wear trousers and jumpers, when they aren't in uniform."

"Yes, they do … I'm just as I said, surprised that you did not choose something different."

"Not all types of clothing would suit me," was all he murmured in reply.

Even though Severus was not looking directly at her father, in his short sleeved, bright plaid shirt, Lily agreed that a riot of color would be a huge adjustment for her friend.

Severus did not know what Lily really meant with her criticism. There was nothing wrong with these clothes that he bought at the muggle store. The selection of clothing he saw bordered on hideous. He intentionally wanted something plain, that covered him, and was suitable for wearing in both muggle and wizarding environments.

During dinner, Severus was quiet but would give Lily a sullen look occasionally as he thought over her comments. He was never going to dress like her father, if that's who she was using as an example of a well-dressed muggle. Severus was not a jovial, good-natured person whom bright colors suited. Mr. Evans' arms were also meaty so the sleeve hems were filled, rather than flapping feebly around wiry, insignificant arms like his.

Afterwards, they said their farewells, Lily got what she packed and shrunk. and went out back with Severus to use the spot between their shed and fence from which to apparate. Considering she did not want any incidents when they were expected, Lily allowed Severus to apparate the two of them to Mould-on-the-Wold after he called Phi, who had been lurking nearby. Lily's owl would be sent to her with a letter either tomorrow or the next day, and she'd reply to send her back.

Severus looked around, then said, "Moonshine used the inn as a reference point in his directions. It's this way."

"Are you alright, Sev?" Lily asked as she walked beside him.

"Sure."

"Oh, you were quiet at dinner. Dad even mentioned football."

"I was thinking."

"What about?"

"Nothing unusual or harmful."

"Hmm, and how are you feeling?"

"Feeling?" Severus repeated before coming to a complete stop to look at Lily. "Feeling about what?"

"Yourself, Severus."

"Oh." Severus paused to think, then started walking again. Usually if someone asked him that out of politeness, he replied with the socially acceptable 'fine', since no one cared what he answered. Lily usually told him how he felt, rather than asking for his opinion. "I'm looking forward to the change of location here. My house has always been quiet when only mother was home, but I am bothered by her missing. If my apprenticeship is not close to where we live, I may sell it."

It's not quite what Lily meant when she asked, but Sev's response was interesting. Rather than saying that no one would want to buy his house, she asked, "Is that why you go to London so much?"

"Perhaps. I don't do much there so that is growing boring."

"How can Quality Quidditch Supplies ever get boring?" Lily kidded.

"Because Nimbus can't come out with new models fast enough to please me. We're turning down here."

Lily looked around. They were leaving the hard-packed dirt road for a well-worn, wide path that was slightly overgrown on both sides.

"There's no street lights out here to find our way after dark," Lily observed.

Severus was not sure if Lily was complaining, or commenting on how rural the area was.

After another minute or two of walking, Lily asked, "Is that it?"

Severus supposed it was their destination. He knew he was not in a position to judge other people's homes, but the sprawling jumble of buildings and additions was a sloppy patchwork of construction and dubious maintenance. Was that a live chicken running across the dusty dirt in front of what was probably the main door? That prodded his brain regarding raising livestock. He had meant to learn more about food animals when he was considering taking care of Lily, when they married. Did that one escape, or did they run loose for exercise? Maybe it was intentionally loose since there was a four legged animal wandering around also.

Whatever it was, it was eating an unkempt, scraggly bush. It had shaggy hair that was long and matted. It stopped long enough to bleat at them, before resuming its meal. Considering that sheep were useful for their hair, also provided mutton, kept lawns cropped and made a 'baa' noise, he asked, "Is that a sheep?"

"Sev! That's a goat." Lily stared at Severus. How could he not know the difference between a sheep and a goat? They looked nothing alike.

"Oh … oh, they provide milk?"

"Uh, I guess that one could, but goats sometimes have a temper so I'm not going to check for you."

"Temper?"

"Yeah, they run into people and knock them down. Maybe bite too."

Severus looked at the animal in a new light. He had been warned from an early age regarding dogs and biting. There were no goats in Spinner's End so there had been no need to list them along with the other dangerous animals like dogs, cats, rats, bees, hornets and pigeons.

For a wizarding house, Lily was not impressed. Chickens and goats in the front garden that was not maintained, along with shoddy, sprawling makeshift construction where possibly magic was the only thing holding it together.

Keeping an eye on the goat, Severus lifted the door knocker and allowed it to drop.

A young blonde woman, wearing an apron, with her hair up in a messy knot with a brass stirring rod holding it in place answered. "Hey, wotcha … oh, now I know where I remember the name Evans. You're a Gryffindor."

"Um, yeah."

"It's the red hair that I remember. I was in seventh, when you two were sorted."

"I don't recall your name," Lily admitted.

"It's ..."

"Tess!" was yelled behind her.

She shrugged and yelled back, "It's them!"

There was the patter of feet, and a couple children popped out on each side of Tess. Severus stepped back.

A male voice yelled, "Out of the way. No one's here to see you lot."

Tess moved forward to make way for Regulus Moonshine, the Potions Master. He shuffled forward into the doorway wearing his tartan carpet slippers and a stained robe over his shirt and trousers. Probably a bathrobe since it was a worn, red velvet with a tasseled sash. He was not so old that his attire during the daylight evening hours while awaiting guests was excusable. Moonshine was a wizard who found traditional long hair and beards properly fashionable. His was grey at the roots, gradually turning dark brown towards the ends.

"Ah, Mr. Snape," Moonshine said as he extended his hand.

Having already reviewed Moonshine's vitae before accepting the offer, Severus properly addressed him while extending his hand in return, "Professor."

"Very good, and ..." Moonshine stopped to stare at Lily, then exclaimed, "You're a girl."

Annoyed that this fellow put his apprentice in a flowered apron, and was some sort of throwback who did not recognize the women's liberation movement, she replied, "Well spotted."

"I mean … Mr. Snape only referred to you by your last name, Evans. He never elaborated on … the particulars."

"My OWL achievements are the same nonetheless," Lily insisted.

"Miss Evans is as qualified as I," Severus added. Why was this fellow insulting Lily simply because she was a woman? He had a female apprentice.

"That's … uh, I thought it would be two lads. There's uh, two beds, of course, but they are together."

"You said something like that in your letter," Lily agreed. "I've known Severus since before we started at Hogwarts. We don't have a problem with it."

"Uh … well then … I guess I'll show you to … oh, Tess, did you get down there?"

"No, I was up here the whole afternoon. I didn't have a free moment."

Moonshine sighed and shook his head, "I'll get it then. If you two will follow me, I'll point out some things that need doing on the way."

Severus had a good idea why Tess had little time to study for her Potions mastership by the time they reached their destination. Moonshine wanted extensive landscaping work, beside rejuvenating his potions plants, both in his dilapidated greenhouses and out of doors. He also had a general idea of where wild mistletoe could be harvested, and he needed different batches during different phases of the moon.

Staring at the object before them, Severus was confused. What was it? It was raised above the ground, and had a wheel on each side.

"It hasn't been opened in a while. Tess was supposed to get down here earlier."

"Oooh, a caravan," Lily claimed excitedly.

"We went on a couple vacations in it when we were into muggles and such."

"You drive?" Lily asked.

"The wife did. She was muggle-born and didn't want to give it all up."

Moonshine used his wand to charm the folding camper to the open position.

Meanwhile, Lily told Severus, "Tunie and I always wanted to take a trip in one. It hooks up to a car, and gets pulled behind it."

"You'd be in it, while it was being pulled?"

"No, we'd be in the car while on the highway. When we got to the camp or shore or wherever we're going, it would get opened up. Though we wanted to go in the one that didn't fold, with the bunkbeds and kitchenette."

Despite Lily's enthusiasm that this shelter on wheels was a standard muggle vacation vehicle, he didn't like the look of it. To him, it seemed fragile, especially when compared to Hogwarts or his own brick house in Spinner's End. At least a tent would be firmly on the ground, rather than balanced on one axle. It was attached to a post to steady it, but he had not put it to any sort of test yet.

Lily was disappointed that this was a very simple caravan. It would have to be to fold down like this. Nothing above waist height, and it wasn't big at all. Definitely long enough for them to lay down with a little extra, on the two bench like couches on either side of the low table. There was a door up front, that was rather clever the way it was hidden away when it was folded down. There were also windows high up on the side walls.

"Is there a lavatory?" Severus asked.

"There's an outhouse over there," Moonshine said as he pointed out a little shack, "and there's a water tank that you can fill and stand under over that way."

"Does your family come down this way often?"

"No, Tess keeps the kids close to the house so she can keep a better eye on them."

"What time would you like us up at the house tomorrow?" Lily asked.

"Breakfast is at seven. Then I'll show you what needs doing in the lab."

Lily made a face. The lab and all this work outside? This fellow had some pretty big plans for them.

It wasn't till they were alone that Severus pointed out, "I don't see how his apprentice gets any learning done. Caring for children, and there was food on her apron so she probably helps with meals. He may be taking advantage of her doing whatever is asked of her."

"How does someone get out of an apprentice contract?"

"It's not easy. He could poison her name to the point where no one else would take her on."

"Maybe your idea about writing to Healer Pye's a good one."

"If you don't want to write her, don't, Lily."

"What if I end up wiping noses for years?"

Severus shrugged. He had told this to Lily before, but now that she saw that it could happen, she grew concerned.

"Let me see what Phi needs before we … get too comfortable."

"I'll try to get that stuffy smell cleared out," Lily answered. She made too much noise for them to leave windows open till they were ready to go to sleep.

"You might have to cast charms directly on the upholstery. They might have gotten damp in the past."

"Are there sheets for those?"

"He didn't say."

"I don't want to lay directly on them."

"If you don't find anything, we can transfigure whatever we need."

Lily lost patience quickly, and decided to fix the interior to her liking. Severus could lock and ward everything when they were out. Stupid old man would probably pry into things like Dumbledore. They were seventeen. Sev thought Phi would be a good lookout, and he was making her a a shelter against rain. When they left at the end of their six weeks, she'd put it all back.

As Severus entered, he told Lily, "I filled the tank with water, if you want it. In the evening the sun might have warmed it all day … what did you do?"

"I wanted one bed, Sev. It's covered with nice fresh sheets."

"I'll make a table and chairs outside. We can work on homework there, when we have time."

"Do you have much left?"

"I can work on my Arithmancy and Runes over weekends, if you want."

"If you need more time, you can work on it here. I have a bit of Divination left. I'd rather have it all done before we go on vacation."

"Did you want to do anything else first, or should I change into those pajamas?"

Lily was ready to smack herself in the head. She told Severus that he needed to wear pajamas, and now she didn't want him wearing anything. She answered, "Sure. Let me get out my nightie, and I'll change too. Could you get the door please?"

"Yeah, I'll ward it. I'm going to crack this window so I can hear Phi. I think she understands."

"Uh, I'll try to keep quiet."

"He should have no reason to complain if we get our work done. Moonshine certainly has enough in mind so we shouldn't be idle."

"Do you think we'll learn anything?"

"Other than to be cautious over our apprenticeships?" Severus asked as he took out the grey nightshirt.

Lily took out a frilly babydoll. She was going to leave the matching bloomers in her bag, but then decided to put them on the side to put on later in case someone came to check on them.

"I checked the post this thing is connected to. It seems stable, however maybe we shouldn't get too active."

Lily laughed, "It would be funny, if we knew we wouldn't get hurt."

Smirking, Severus replied, "At least you realize that's a possibility."

"Is there some sort of levitation spell we could use on ourselves?"

Realizing Lily meant something new for them, he reminded her, "We can cast it on each other, but the subject will drop if the caster stops concentrating."

"I think that's a new spell you should work on, Sev." She stopped talking to watch him finish getting undressed. He still hadn't told her what happened to him. How long was that going to take? It wouldn't be forever since Sev was starting to tell her things. There were going to be things that Lily didn't want to hear, but were important like Severus being unhappy and missing his mum.

Severus saw Lily staring at him. It was uncomfortably small in here. The ceiling was high enough that he could stand, but he could touch it when he barely put his arms over his head while changing. Was she expecting him to do something clumsy or funny?

Lily's mouth quirked at Sev's nightshirt. He was right. She'd want easy access to his broom so something like her nightgowns would keep her happy. If it was dark, it wouldn't matter.

"Are you changing, Lily?"

"Oh, yeah, I was wondering if you liked this?" she asked, holding up the nightie she had already chosen.

"It's fine."

She was disappointed that Severus was sorting through his things, rather than watching her disrobe. Did he think she was getting too fat? Mum had made a couple comments regarding her weight, but Lily couldn't help it. She was hungry.

Lily decided to pose herself on the bed before she called, "OK, Sev. I'm ready."

He was relieved that Lily was seductively posed in a non-revealing manner, rather than some pornographic pose similar to those photographs. He didn't want Lily to become one of those kind of disgusting witches, even if it was only with him.

Smiling as Severus crawled up the bed to her, Lily cooed, "At last."

Tucking his wand in the crevice between the bed and wall, Severus asked, "What should we do first?"

"Don't be silly, Sev. Kiss me."

Other than restraining herself so they did not get the caravan rocking over the wheel chocks, Lily was immensely pleased with their evening. It was sort of like Valentine's Day when Severus preferred the slow love making, rather than Lily's wild enthusiasm. One thing flowed into another, and then they both dozed off with Lily's bum still rubbing against Severus while he held her.

Lily did not think she had been asleep long when she woke because she was hot, or maybe because Sev was snoring. She was definitely overheating with him right on top of her so she shifted to put some room between them and to get some air on more of her body.

Feeling lazy, she reached around for her wand to open the windows so she wouldn't have to get up and manually open them. As soon as her hand touched it, Lily knew she found Sev's wand instead of her own. It felt solid, or not to say that Lily's wand was not solid, but hers had a flexible feeling to it. Sev's didn't feel springy like hers. Although Ollivander had said hers was good for charms work, Sev was not bad at Charms. Though his wand thought different since the windows barely budged. They moved just enough for Lily to know that she had cast a spell. After a couple tries, she stuffed it back next to the bed and gave up. Stupid, stubborn wand.

When Severus woke during the night, it was because Lily was playing with his anatomy. He rolled onto her and gave her what she wanted. If she started waking him every night or multiple times in one night, he'd complain.

She still had her hand on him when he woke to the dawning morning. Lily was asleep. He wondered if she had held his cock all night. He momentarily speculated over that, but if she was not getting rough with it so he couldn't sleep, it was alright. Though if she tightened her grip like she was doing now when he tried to pry Lily off, that was going to be a problem. He elbowed her and murmured, "Lily, let go."

"Hmm?"

"I need to get up, so let go of me."

"What time is it?"

"Close to six. We can walk slow up to the house and plan between us what gardening would be easy to start on. If we have the option, did you want to work inside, while I stay outside?"

"Why?"

"I thought when we were talking over the possible work, you did not care for gardening."

"Uh … I didn't mean you couldn't handle ingredients or anything … maybe we should stick together when we can."

"Or do outside work early in the morning, or later in the afternoon."

"Well, we still need to find out what else he has in mind."

"Could you let go of me?"

"Oh, sorry."

After he dressed, Severus told Lily, who was dozing off, "I'll be back soon."

He came back and woke her up. "I left a basin of water on the table outside so you can brush your teeth or whatever with it. The water tank is arranged more for showering."

"You're dressed in your old stuff."

"If I'm doing all that yardwork, why not?"

"Eh," Lily said in agreement. The fellow was wearing an old dressing gown when he met them last night, and didn't bother to put on a regular pair of shoes to show them down here.


	44. Chapter 44 Do you think I'm stupid?

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 44 Do you think I'm stupid?

Although Severus was not interested in knowing, Lily found out from Tess that these eight children were not actually Regulus Moonshine's. Three were grandchildren, there was a great niece, two great nephews, and two second cousins. Mrs. Moonshine had predeceased her husband about four years ago, and there was a witch who came a couple times a week to clean and help with laundry.

The children's parents were either studying, working or victims of He Who Must Not Be Named, and imposed on the Potions Master since his home was large enough to house them, and there were other children already there.

Sometimes adults stayed here for a while too, but no one was currently here, and the elderly mother in law had recently been admitted for long-term care at St. Mungo's.

It was enough for Lily to rethink her wish that she had a large family with tons of relatives. That had been one of the qualities she wished for in a husband so she would get an instantly large extended family, sort of like Helen's, but not if they dropped off their children and never came back for them. Well, except for the parents that were dead. That was a different story.

Rather than bogging his mind down with the meaningless details, Severus took more of an analytical view. Although Moonshine was better off than him, as a Potions Master, he was mired down in all these interruptions to his time. There was also the inconvenience of having children running about and making the house a frightful mess. Yes, frightful was the word for it.

He apparently was strapped for finances, if the food served at his table was any indicator. Their first breakfast was porridge with a side of diced potatoes that were soaked in gravy then fried in a skillet till crisp. No tea. No toast. No fruit. Severus did not want dubious porridge or potatoes, and saw that Lily was ready to cry since there was no bacon, sausage or any greasy fried flesh to savor.

After watching Lily sullenly shovel potatoes into her mouth, Severus decided he should say something, in case lunch was also limited, rather than skipping a second meal. "Attending Hogwarts, I probably forgot to even think about it. Evans was one of the students attacked by a werewolf, she only got wounded, but they're cursed so her desires for food were altered. I'd be happy to go to whatever store's nearby to purchase food, if it's not normally served at your table, sir. Considering I'm living with Evans, it's merely self-preservation to keep her content."

"Sev!"

Moonshine thoughtfully stroked his chin, "I had read about that. Flesh, right? Well, with the young ones, I don't want them getting their fingers any more greasy than they naturally are."

"It's alright," Lily insisted. "Maybe I'll drop the stone I've gained if there's nothing to tempt me, and I'm working, rather than studying. There's certainly enough to keep me busy and my nose out a book."

"That was in the paper. A stone in less than a year?" Tess asked while bringing out another large bowl of porridge.

"My body's still adjusting to my change of eating habits, and at Hogwarts, there's huge platters of everything."

A boy with a mouth full of porridge, asked, "You go to Hogwarts?"

"Yes," was all Lily answered since the Potions Master hissed at the boy.

"I'm trying to think," Moonshine explained. His eyes became unfocused, as he murmured aloud, "Cursed wounds. Yes, something magical would be needed to counter that. Craving flesh. That would need to be suppressed somehow. There's a mixed bag of potions for appetite suppression. One does target sweets. Interesting. Not many survive a werewolf attack without getting bitten."

"It would be of assistance to bitten victims too," Lily commented, warming to the subject. "My roommate was bitten and infected, and she is eating just as much as me."

"I think it's called gorging," Severus mentioned.

"I don't eat that badly."

"There's a shop in town. They got some groceries, and can order anything special," Tess said, replying to the original inquiry.

"We have work to do, Sev."

"I know. I'll nip out before lunch, if you can last that long."

Noticing that Severus ate nothing, Lily challenged, "Can you?"

Knowing that Lily would not want to get into a battle of wills with who could go without food longer, Severus merely lifted a brow at her.

The Potions Master took them to one of the workrooms, and there was a large amount of raw materials that had arrived that needed to be specifically prepared and then jarred for storage. Lily and Severus could do the work, and they got to it once they got everything they needed laid out. Severus gave Lily the choice of which body part she'd prefer to harvest since they needed eyeballs, tongues, livers and spleens. Severus ended up with digging out livers and spleens before disposing, while Lily scooped them out of the barrel, gouged out the eyes, pried open the rigid jaws and cut out the stiff little tongue.

They had filled a couple separate jars with eyes, tongues, spleens and livers when Lily decided to take a break. The barrel was so big, the level of specimens was still close to the top. They resealed the barrel since Lily preferred to start dicing roots for while since her fingers were tired of opening little mouths that did not want to open.

When they went into the nearest lavatory to wash, Severus wondered if the black mustache and beard drawn on the mirror was penned by the previous occupant, or if it was a permanent art installation. He was lost in thought about a child's face would have approximately the same spacing as his to line up the drawings to suit any viewer willing to shift their face to the proper position, when Lily blurted out, "Oh darn, the water's not going down."

Severus looked down at the sink, full of soapy water from them both washing up. "Is the drain open?"

"I don't think there was anything there. No lever up here anyways."

Since he hadn't noticed, Severus pulled up his sleeve and put his hand in to feel. There was nothing there, just an opening. "There could be something in the pipe."

"Do they need a plumber?"

"Maybe, if it's bad. Let me take the pipe off."

"But what about the water?"

"I think this floor could use a little water," Severus muttered as he knelt down to get under the sink to the part where the pipe bent back up.

"Don't you need tools?"

"I do have my wand, Lily."

Water did spill down onto the floor once Severus removed the U-bend. It was packed with gobstones, a couple clothespins, a knut, what could be a small, bald doll's head along with hair and plain old dark slimy gunk. He removed everything from it, and then _accio'd _everything that had moved past it, into the next section of pipe. That was only more slimy and hairy junk. After he picked out everything of possible dubious value, he banished the water and the debris, and put the pipe back into place. Turning the faucet on, he was pleased the water drained as quickly as it was pouring in. "I'll give this stuff to them. If I leave it here, it could fall back into the sink."

Lily rolled her eyes. She doubted it would fall in by accident.

Severus began dicing roots with her, but she noticed that it was already midmorning. She had been thinking about steak, nice and rare, since breakfast. Actually, it was rather disgusting since she had spent a couple hours prying out eyeballs and tongues to think of food, but curses were like that.

"Why don't you go to the store, while I keep working on this, Sev? That way we can have lunch at the same time as everyone else."

"With them, or outside?"

"Whatever is fine with me."

"Alright, let me turn in the gobstones and take a quick look at the kitchen. If I'm cooking for you, I guess I should know what they have before I buy anything."

"Cook?" Lily repeated.

"I know you like your meat rare, Lily, but you do want it at least warmed to body temperature?"

"A bit more than that, Sev."

"I also want to see if they have something to keep meat cold. If I can do one trip a day, rather than one before every meal, that would be more efficient."

"Alright," Lily replied, still a bit dazed that Severus offered to cook for her. She hoped he knew what he was doing because she didn't want to hurt his feelings if it came out badly.

Tess was in the kitchen, working on something in a large pot when Severus entered. He put the items he was carrying on the counter and said, "I took these out of the pipe of one of the lavatories."

"Oh … yeah, a lot of sinks have that problem."

"Before I went to the store, I wanted to stop here in the kitchen to see if there was somewhere to keep food cold so if I bought more for later, it would keep."

"That sealed cabinet there," Tess said, pointing with a dripping spoon. "It might be full. Take a look."

Severus' eyes narrowed as he stared at some open-eyed animal head, perhaps the goat he saw yesterday, with the neck sitting in congealed goo on a plate in the cooled cabinet. Was this supposed to be funny? He was supposed to open it and scream in surprise? Tess' back was to him as she had already gone back to whatever it was she was cooking. Did people normally have heads around their kitchens? There was never something like this in the Evans' well-lit refrigerator when Mrs. Evans opened it. With their own supply of animals here, unlike Mrs. Evans who got her meats cut and wrapped by the butcher, perhaps this was typical.

He glanced at the cooking area. Like Hogwarts, there was an open fire grate in the kitchen. He learned how to cook a steak on that. Severus did not like the idea of cooking meat in a skillet sizzling in its own fat.

On the way to the store, Severus cut back one side of the path with his wand, and on the way back, trimmed the other side. They did not pass this way on their walk to the caravan last night, but Severus already assumed that everything needed maintenance around here.

He put the bag of food inside the caravan, and took the two steaks and some items for himself to the house, storing the wrapped meat in the cooler.

Lily was still dicing roots and packing yet another jar of them when Severus came in and joined her.

"So what's for lunch?"

"I got you a steak for both lunch and dinner. You like them every meal?"

"If I get bored with them, I'll let you know."

Severus did not doubt that.

"You should have saw me earlier, Sev. I bet I was cutting as fast as you before my hands got tired."

"Did you want to work outside after lunch?"

"How hot is it?"

"Not bad."

"There's so much to do in here."

"I agree."

"Do you think there will be new things added tomorrow?"

"Maybe. I trimmed plants on my way to town and back so that's done."

Lily huffed and kept dicing. She hated this job and she hadn't even done it a whole day.

At least she found out at lunch that Severus could prepare a nice, rare steak. It was a bit on the small side, and the one for dinner was equally small. Lily had been spoiled by the Hogwarts' portions, and her mum always having plenty for when she requested seconds and sometimes thirds.

On the way back to the caravan that evening, Severus did some more trimming and offered, "If you want to take a longer shower, Lily, I can keep filling the tank for you. If you want it warmed a bit, I can do that too."

"Oh, Sev, that would be great. After all that gutting and gouging this morning, and working outside for a bit this afternoon, I could use a long shower. Not too hot though."

After a lovely and long shower, Lily waited inside the caravan for Severus to join her after he took care of Phi and washed up himself. It was nice he let her go first because she needed extra time to comb out her hair and she also got comfortable on the bed, waiting for him and listening to the radio.

Tonight, Lily was worn out from a day of working so they only made love till it got completely dark and then she slept straight through till morning. Severus woke Lily after he was already dressed.

Their second or third days were similar to the first, except Severus had fruit for them to snack on during their walk up to the house. On the fourth morning, Lily woke before Severus, even though it was starting to get light out, and spent time staring at him sleep. He still snored and drooled. The new cute thing was his nightshirt had ridden up and the bottom side of one of his bum cheeks was exposed. She fondled his bum, and Severus woke with a start.

"Sorry to wake you, Sev."

"It's alright. Usually Phi doesn't do that."

"You're joking right?"

"Jealous of Miss Phi?"

"She's out there, and I'm in here," Lily murmured and let her hand reach under the front side of his nightshirt.

"I don't think you have to worry about her being jealous of you, Lily. I think she understands. Ravens pair with only one mate."

Lily muttered, "I'm not worried about that silly bird," as she continued stroking Severus.

"Did you want to get on top?"

"Of course, Sev. Roll on your back."

Lily started her day in a better mood so day four of their servitude practically flew by. One more day till they had their first weekend. Friday also went quickly for her since she was looking forward to going home.

Regulus Moonshine had some ideas on the flesh related appetite suppressant. It was an interesting idea. He also noticed a few things were repaired about the place, and found out it was Snape. He was handy at fixing most anything. Besides making a noticeable difference in the yard and the lab prep duties.

He told Snape and Evans he was pleased with their progress before they departed before dinner Friday. They planned to eat at Evans' home that evening. Lily had already confirmed it in her letter to her mother when her owl had visited.

Over dinner, Lily was chatting about their whole week and slipped, mentioning the caravan.

"A caravan?" Mrs. Evans asked.

"Yeah, not quite what Tunie and I wanted to go around in because it's a folding one, with nothing above waist level."

"A wizard has a caravan?" Mr. Evans asked.

"The professor's wife was muggleborn and drove and all," Lily explained.

"The two of you are sleeping in a caravan?" Mrs. Evans clarified.

"It's not a nice caravan, mum. There's a little table in the center, with a low sofa on each side that's also a hard bed. Sev's got to cast charms to keep the bugs away because we need to keep the windows open because it's so smelly in there."

Severus only looked at Lily. He did not know why she even brought the caravan up.

"Mmm," Lily's mother said while shaking her head.

"At least any vacation via caravan is off, huh?" Mr. Evans suggested.

"I didn't want to go somewhere by caravan this summer, dad."

"Oh, I did get to the library, Lily. Got a bunch of travel books for you," Mrs. Evans commented. "They're up on your desk."

"How about I look those over, Sev, and then I'll show you the good stuff? That way you can get some of your other homework done."

"That's fine," he replied. Since Lily was so particular, he might as well let her narrow it down to a list of places she'd like to visit. It was better he did not see too many places he'd want to go that Lily did not want to travel to. The past week had been nice with Lily. Sort of like they used to be. Maybe it was him being hopeful that made him see things between them going well. All the sleep he had gotten over the past few nights had put him in an odd mood. Severus could not even explain why he was sleeping at all in that box on wheels that could easily tip over, start rolling, or be easily infiltrated by bugs, animals or people.

The next morning, Lily already had some possibilities. He was interested in Australia and New Zealand since those were possible places to which he could move. Lily did not find anything in either country worth visiting? Lily did give him a couple words about each place. She liked islands and listed a few - Fiji, Tahiti, Hawaii, St. Croix and Bermuda. Severus had not visited a beach before so he wouldn't mind going to one to see it. These were all supposed to be picturesque with palm trees. He said, "If you want to go to a island for the beach, any of these are fine with me."

"What about the other place?"

"What is it?"

"It's new. It opened a few years ago and I saw it on telly."

"What is it?" Severus repeated.

"Let me get the book. It's hard to explain what it is."

"Is it named after someone?"

"Yeaaaah," Lily answered in a whine as she ran up the stairs.

He didn't know why she said it that way. If it was a famous muggle, Severus was not likely to recognize his name. He just thought the name of the place sounded like it was named after someone. Sort of pretentious. If he built something for people to come see, he would not name it Severus Snape World. He'd give it something more descriptive to lure visitors.

Studying the list, he suspected that was Lily's favorite was whatever this was. The rest of the list were islands. Either she wanted to go to an island, which he already agreed to, or her inquiry meant he was overlooking the preferable choice. She didn't even say where this was … although it was followed by 'world'. Did that make it big like an island, or bigger like Australia?

Lily bounding down the stairs, explaining, "This is better than just a beach, Sev. They have a beach, and there's boats, but there's also things for you to do." That was all Severus needed to believe this was Lily's favorite out of the list.

"Alright."

"You didn't look at anything, Sev."

"If this is where you want to go, Lily, I'll go with you."

"But Sev, I don't want you to go only because I want to go."

"Why not?"

"You're not even looking at this."

He looked at the grey turreted castle with blue round roofing on the cover and asked, "There's a castle at this beach?"

"It's a fake castle, but there's rides and shows. And then the hotel's got a Polynesian theme with its own beach."

"Fine."

"So we just need to pick dates, book a portkey to Florida, and reserve our hotel room."

Severus nodded, "I'll complete my homework in the next couple of weeks."

Lily was happy that things were decided, however Severus did not seem to care where they were going. She had purposely arranged the list with Walt Disney World along with islands which were mostly laying on the beach or learning to surf. The resort had opened in the United States maybe five years ago, and had lots of stuff on television, even over here. It looked really nice and a lot of fun. Once the cost of air fare was not a factor, it was an expensive hotel, but the pictures made it look gorgeous and worth every pound, or was it dollar over there? Anyway, even Tunie had liked the looks of it.

At dinner Sunday, Severus had returned, at her mother's insistence, and Mrs. Evans asked, "Lily mentioned that the two of us, that's my husband and I, could come with you to Florida. How can we do that?"

"Touch the portkey, like us," Severus replied. "If it's our portkeys, that we paid for, we can let anyone we want touch it. They mail them to us, so we don't have to go to their office or a gathering point that they choose."

"It's magic," Mr. Evans explained.

"I took mum over to Sev's with magic," Lily reminded him.

"There's a difference between an emergency and … abusing it."

"We pay for it whether one or a dozen crowd around it," Severus reiterated. "There's a law in Britain about any wizard creating their own portkey. That's where it crosses over into abuse, when people make their own. I've done some reading on it. A portkey's not hard to create, it just has to be somewhere I know as the destination."

"I know you said something before about a law, but why? When we're going to London to visit Diagon Alley, we're outside apparation range and have to apparate, walk then floo," Lily complained.

Severus shrugged, "Maybe because the Ministry regulates the floo network, and wants to keep tabs on things? Or just to keep wizards who aren't so self-sufficient jobs moving piles of paper? Or perhaps it's a conspiracy by businesses to bring people into their shops, when all they want to do is be able to use a floo connection."

"That's so stupid."

Severus stopped talking. He wasn't sure if Lily was saying he was stupid, or the Ministry was stupid.

When he returned to Spinner's End, Severus remained agitated and worked on arithmancy and dark arts through the night. Laying in bed, thinking about Lily, would be nonproductive. By morning, he was feeling great and did not care what Lily thought as he walked to her house so they could return to work.

They already had a routine from the week before that included Severus' daily trip for additional food, grilling a quarter-pound steak for Lily two meals a day, allowing her to take a long shower first while he kept the water in the tank and maintained the temperature for her, and finishing their day with leisurely love making before falling asleep next to each other.

Severus received an owl from his solicitor, in reply to his inquiry regarding Dumbledore's wealth, when Lily's showed up for her. He felt really dim. Phoenix tears. Of course, they were worth a lot due to their life-saving properties. Dumbledore had a phoenix and sold the tears. Simply put, he was a lucky bastard to a have a rare familiar. No special skill was needed to collect or sell them. And at this price here, Dumbledore was not distributing them out of the goodness of his heart either. Undoubtedly he had a pointy-hatted crony at St. Mungo's that agreed to pay this with no negotiation. Maybe those were the only people Dumbledore saved, ones in such dire shape they needed phoenix tears, and he'd floo them to St. Mungo's.

Phoenix tears were very difficult to break down. Severus knew that in passing from last year when he was trying to find rare substances that were of enormous benefit. Did Moonshine have books with their intrinsic properties listed?

"Sev?" Lily called, after he started walking.

"What?"

"Wait for me. You didn't even say anything when you left."

"I thought you might have a long letter."

"It's from my mum. You know that. What do you have there?"

"It's … about something I was thinking of. I need to do more research."

"Oooh, can I help?"

Lily knew who had phoenix tears. She might see his new endeavor as a waste of time because the old bastard did sell them to St. Mungo's. "I might use some help, but it's going to turn into an arithmancy project so I don't know if you'd find it enjoyable."

Rolling her eyes, Lily replied, "No, I wouldn't, Sev. You said the one thing so far that worked was not so great, maybe you should apply yourself elsewhere, other than arithmancy."

"I am working for a Potions Master," he reminded her.

"As his handyman. We're not brewing _anything_."

"I don't think his apprentice gets much of a chance at that either, unless they are having soup for dinner."

"It's not Tess' fault," Lily said defensely.

"I didn't mean to imply that it was. Speed does not equate with brilliance. In her case, it's everything else around here that keeps her out of the lab."

"How are you getting so much done? Those kids are all over me at times, unless I shut the lab door and bolt it."

"I don't respond to them. You did."

"I'm polite, Sev."

"That's why you were surrounded by a pack in Spinner's End. Don't trust children just because they are younger than you. If they outnumber you, being bigger is not going to help."

"This is not Spinner's End."

"Without his apprentice's favorable influence, they could be. They don't respect her, but they recognize she will take care of them." The children also had some deficiency which caused them to embrace the apprentice frequently. Guessing it was some odd means of trying to keep them in line, he noticed she touched them back, like patting their heads or shoulders.

"What do you know about children, Sev?" Lily challenged.

"Not much about caring for them, but I do know without discipline, rules and consequences, they become rotten and useless."

Lily searched her mind for an example to counter Sev's argument, but thought up so many that fit it. Crap. Maybe if she hadn't been sorted into Gryffindor, she'd know of some. If there weren't so many toerag students at Hogwarts, she bet they could be taught a lot more. They had to realize not everyone was like Severus, who was used to being given shelves of books at a young age and just let to learn on his own, once he could read well. Lily went to a school where things were explained carefully and demonstrated. Her primary school had been very educational. Now students like Severus left her behind because they knew what else to look for. Lily had access to the library, but had different interests than Sev. His main goal was protection and being ready for any scenario that he could think up. Stupid toerags used that to say he was learning Dark Arts. Why did she ever listen to them? She knew Severus better than any of them. Accidentally dropping a tree branch on Petunia was the first sign of a dark wizard? If there had been a tree around when Petunia called Lily a slut, the whole thing would have crashed down on her.

When Lily went quiet, Severus was afraid he had crossed the line. Rules were not a bad thing. Lily was probably considering how perfect her children would be, and like her, would immediately know right from wrong because they would spring forth from her all-knowing fountain as wise as her. Once Lily married her ideal wizard and these precious offspring emerged, Lily could consider not let Severus visit since he did not understand anything about good children. He only knew the worthless refuse that grew up in and around Spinner's End who did not deserve nice toys, hot dinners and dependable heat during the winter.

Why the hell was he thinking about such crap? He had to think about phoenix tears. If he could get in a little research before he moved around fixing things the poor, misunderstood children broke, Severus could contemplate it during the mindless tedium. What would work better is Mr. Filch's method of fixing things as they broke, rather than letting it get so bad that everything was reduced to rubbish.

When they reached the house, Severus asked Lily, "Were you going to start in the lab this morning, or should the two of us work outside till it gets too hot?"

"Um, the lab. I'm tired of trimming trees."

"Were you coming with me tonight to collect mistletoe?"

"What?"

"When the full moon is at its height, is when it needs to be collected. I cut through the thicker trees to the town last week, and I've seen where it is. I have to get up the tree with a special knife and basket, but I can do it alone."

"Maybe I should come in case you fall."

"Alright, did you want to work a full day today and see if we can leave early Friday?"

"Whatever the professor says is fine. There's a lot in the lab."

When they got to the small riot around the dining table for breakfast, Severus eased his way around to where Moonshine was seated, and addressed him, "Professor, tonight with the full moon Evans and I will collect the mistletoe. May we leave two hours early on Friday to even out our time?"

The Potions Master frowned. He did remember that annoying codicil from the Slytherin, however he was getting a lot of work out of these two. "That will be fine."

"Also, before I started today, would it be possible for me to make use of your texts, I had an inspiration and wanted to research the basics so I could think over the possible approaches."

"About the hunger suppressant?"

"No, unfortunately not. However, that might also be useful for hags."

"Hags … that's definitely a possibility. Wizards understand their urges, especially with regards to small children. Oh, yes, you know which door? It's a bit of a mess in there because one of the sets of shelves got tipped, maybe you could tidy it up?"

"Of course, sir," he replied, and moved back to where Lily was seated, eating those crispy potatoes.

"Lily, did you want to help sort books in the professor's library? He said a shelf got tipped over and it'll need sorting."

When Lily's lip curled up, he added, "Or the lab. I was only giving the option so you knew there was someplace different we could work this morning."

Sighing, Lily knew it wasn't Sev's fault. It was actually nice of him to share whatever mess was in the library, and spare the callouses that were finally hardening on her fingers from wielding a knife for hours at a time. "I'll come with you. It might be a while before we find whatever book you need if they're all over the place."

Like so much else at the Moonshine house, Lily was expecting something else. For a learned man, a Potions Master who could be researching to improve his field, obviously he did not use the books in here. Even Mrs. Snape respected books better than this man. Actually, her books were always nicely shelved, undoubtedly by Severus, but considering the rest of the house at Spinner's End, Lily knew excellent attention was taken with the books. While grumbling to herself about this mess, Lily thought how unfortunate it was that Severus no longer had those books when they were the only thing cared for in that house, probably better than him. Now, Severus was thinking about selling his house. He said it was because of his mum, but Lily suspected it was money. An apprenticeship like this would be unsuitable for Sev, or her, or even Tess. No one deserved to be treated like the live-in help without wages when they were taken in to learn a craft. This whole apprentice system was antiquated.

"I don't think it was just this set of shelves that were tipped."

"Hm, there's not enough left shelved to discern a system even."

"Do you want to stack them together by subject, then we'll shelve them based on what needs the most room?"

"I suppose that plan's as good as any, Lily."

Lily stopped looking at the book she was holding and glanced at Severus. He was accepting her idea without conditions? Without an improvement to make it more efficient? She had thought things were going well, but his newfound composure was caused by something.

"He has a lot of herbology and gardening books. We might have to subdivide those. I'm going to clear out this corner so we can store all these together while we sort," she explained.

"Alright."

"You know if you want me to walk to the store, or cook steaks, or make something for you, Sev, you just have to say something."

"It's alright, Lily. I get in some thinking while I walk, besides trimming more overgrowth and finding mistletoe. Don't you like how I'm preparing the steak, or did you want something else? They have a selection of meats that can be cut to a single serving like that. Maybe chicken?"

"No, it's great, Sev. I only mentioned it because it seems like you are doing extra things for me."

"I don't mind doing things for you."

"I know, but since you made the gesture, I can be thankful and also realize that it's every day, and even though the weather's been great for us working outside, it could rain any day or it could get boring buying two steaks and other things."

"I like looking at the food before I buy it."

"Oh," Lily replied. Now she understood. Sev's disturbed thoughts about food. Lily would not bring back wormy apples or bruised tomatoes. She had eyes too.

She believed Severus was telling the truth that he did not mind going to the store every day. Inspecting the food could make him happy, or at least reassured. So what else could be bothering him? No one was bothering them down at the caravan. Phi was unmolested. Sev watched her shower every evening and she was not knocking over their little shelter by being too aggressive, and Sev seemed to sleep the whole night. Lily was sleeping too, but she woke up frequently. It was too quiet, besides Sev's snoring. Lily did not live on a noisy street, but there was always something in the background. Here, even the crickets got quiet. There went her fanciful ideas about living in the country.

It took them close to two hours to get all the books sorted by category. The only suggestion Severus made was to leave the shelved books where they were, in case they could get an idea where the professor originally shelved that subject. Lily agreed since so few books were shelved, even if she counted the ones that were stacked horizontally on shelves that appeared to have been thrown there haphazardly to get them out of the way to find others.

They started shelving with the narrow shelves near the door with the smallest stacks, after a quick look at what remained on the shelves. A few books on Divination, and the professor's collection of dictionaries for foreign and dead languages got put away first, and then they moved on from there. They had the remaining shelf space discussed when Severus left to procure Lily's steaks. As she resorted the herbology, she was not happy, and redid that section. Lily also had enough time to put the odd items onto the shelves that had empty space. Moonshine had a collection of scales and weights, and Lily started sorting them back into sets. Some were missing weights, but she found a couple under the desk just before Severus returned.

"Hey Sev, I think we're going to need to move the furniture to look under it to see if any of these little weights rolled under."

He kept his sigh to a minimum. Severus was tired of cleaning up this dump. "Alright."

They levitated everything, lifted the rugs, and found the majority of missing weights. Severus suggested that some may have been dropped down sinks, commodes, or even thrown out the window into the garden. He _accio_'d a couple from outside, and one popped out of a deep crack in the floorboards.

Lily personally and silently agreed with the flushed down the toilet guess. These children had no respect for this house, even if they were relatives and long-term guests. At least she didn't have to worry about Petunia raising a little monster. She smirked at the thought that Vernon Jr. would probably wear a pair of rubber gloves to help mommy clean before he wore his first pair of long pants.

"Something funny?" Severus asked, interrupting his comparison between a few sets of weights, trying to guess if they were matched to the correct scale.

"Uh … you might get it. Can you imagine Petunia's children being so untidy?"

"Is that a hypothetical question, or is there already one expected?"

"What?"

"Is Petunia already expecting a baby in the next year?"

"No, it's too soon. Well, maybe not too soon, but they were only married last month, Sev."

Sensing that Lily had slipped back into her youthful and naïve, preconceived notion that unmarried people did not have any chance of becoming parents because they were saving themselves for their future spouses, Severus returned to switching the weights between two scales based on the same style of roman numerals. If the future Mr. Lily Evans, Wizard Extraordinaire, was an absolute swine that Severus could not stand, he could always let the truth slip about how diligently Lily waited. Severus may not have to since Lily had trouble suppressing her speech. After all her warnings about not mentioning anything to her parents about the two of them sharing quarters here, she told them about the caravan within two hours of returning home. He saw the looks on their faces. They knew that a table between the beds, which was actually no longer there, would not keep them separate.

He returned to the library while Lily ate lunch to look for information in addition to what he already knew about phoenix tears. These books had very little. Severus may have to wait until he returned to Hogwarts to research in earnest if there were no books that referred to this substance in the Lestrange vault. There may be books at the Lestrange house or houses.

Severus had given them some thought since he found a fascinating Dark Arts book in the vault that there could be more like it in their holdings. Severus did not want to expose himself, but he wanted more books and had been thinking that maybe there was an answer as to why they acted against his father. It was unlikely. He knew from school that the ones that were interested in that sort of thing gathered, whispered and glared at anyone that ventured close. He had not seen them passing notes that could be intercepted.

It could be that their home was as unkempt as this one. Severus doubted that Moonshine marrying a muggleborn had anything to do with the state of things. It might be funny for him to take the contents of the houses, and then sell them to muggleborns. Were the Lestranges a most noble and ancient house that would writhe in agony at the very thought? Very likely. Yes, a house with lots of bedrooms to encourage them to have large broods of mudbloods running around them.

"I think it's my turn to ask you what's so funny, Sev?"

"Huh?"

"You were standing there with a big smirk of your face."

"Just plotting against my enemies, Lily."

"Severus," she said, rolling her eyes. "You imagine too much. You don't have enemies, now that they're wherever."

"Apparating onto your front porch?"

Lily groaned out, "Toerag."

"Did you ever give him your address?"

"No, but I guess he knows people or paid someone for it. I doubt it was Prof. McGonagall or Hogwarts so I'd guess the Ministry. I did put it on the apparition application."

Lily spent the afternoon thinking about what she'd do to James Potter if he ever showed up at her house again. Magical Law Enforcement sort of made it sound like she was on her own, since she was asked to send an owl if Potter ever did anything. Is that the way the Ministry responded to homes that had Death Eaters knocking down their door? Send an owl? At least Death Eaters might be taken more seriously than James Potter, professional toerag, quidditch player, muggle molester and overall swell bloke because he knew how to spread around all those galleons.

That night, Lily voiced her idea, once it was dark and she was getting lying against Sev, ready to fall asleep, "Hey Sev, do you think there's some way to get Potter to lose his money?"

From Lily, that was an odd question. Had he been talking to himself or in his sleep? "Well, I think his hesitance to pay up for Lupin proves his wealth is not limitless, or he may have learned to do sums and realizes it's a big number."

"Maybe he just doesn't want others to have money."

"It's Mary MacDonald, not me. It probably gave him stabbing pains in the gut to even offer me a hundred galleons."

"But he must realize that if he gave me money, it could also be your money one day."

"Why would I take your money?"

"I meant if we got married. Unless he thought I'd fribble it all away on brooms, jokes and fireworks."

We? And married in the same sentence. There was the big 'if', but no comments referring to hell freezing over. Cautious, Severus suggested, "If you bought your own Nimbus, you could take up quidditch, try out and bump him from that team. I think the Chudley Cannons have consistently finished at the bottom of the league so unless they are cursed with miserable luck, perhaps their players aren't up to the standard of other teams."

"I want to do something meaningful, Sev. Not play quidditch. However, anything to foul up Potter in my spare time would be nice. So start scheming, my Slytherin."

Potter. He was still in Severus' sights, but Dumbledore was preferable. "We should wait till Lupin's thing is settled or not. Provoking Potter when there's a negotiation in progress will not help us."

"Is there a negotiation in progress?"

"There has not been a firm 'no', or a counteroffer through the solicitors. The only communication I know of is Potter showing up at your house."

"And why me?" Lily asked. "Wilkes, Rosier and you are more likely to want to negotiate. Like Mary said, I'd rather Lupin stay in prison, but she needs to protect her future."

In the dark, it was alright for Severus' eyebrows to shoot up. Did Lily forget that he knew that she wanted money too, and not just for MacDonald, but for herself? Now that she had her money, how conveniently she forgot her original reaction. He'd rather pick on Potter than Lily. "Perhaps Potter knew his charm would not work on any of the three of us. Didn't he mention dinner with you? A couple of drinks, some snogging, and he probably thought you'd sign anything for him."

"Ugh. What a conceited, big-headed, hope it swells up so much it unbalances his broom, thing to think. He would. Remember how smarmy he was at school? Especially when they made a game of it and ruined all those girls Hogsmeade weekend this past year?"

"Vaguely. I don't think there were any Slytherin girls that admitted they were tricked."

"That's because you are all so suspicious that you wouldn't fall for something like that. That's what makes it sadder. They preyed on students that wanted to trust them."

"Maybe he'll continue doing that. I don't know how attractive a spot as a reserve on a quidditch team is to a witch, but Potter could have a good time parlaying that into some fun." Severus suspected that Potter still fancied Lily, even though Lily had told him multiple times that Potter was just raving. He doubted Lily would go to dinner or anything with Potter now, but if he did ask again, Severus would like to plant the seed of doubt that Potter was ever serious.

"Who would be that gullible? I think Potter would have a better chance at girls with his money. Isn't that why he was so popular at school?"

It was a pleasure to respond, "You are absolutely right, Lily."

"We can still plan. Whether or not Mary gets anything or Lupin's ever free."

"I think research is called for. I have not been keeping up on what Potter's been doing with himself, other than his parents bragging."

"And nothing illegal, Sev."

"I wouldn't involve you in something like that, Lily. Besides, we're better than him and Black. We don't need to stoop to their level." Severus wanted Lily to feel good about revenge. He didn't want to invest a great deal of time into it, to have her back out, or run off to confess what they were doing. If there was a shady bit to the scheme, Lily couldn't know or she'd go telling everyone that would listen.

****************************

Albus was feeling good. He knew he had done the right thing by assisting with the financial burden of the settlement to get Remus Lupin's appeal considered. As an influential member of the Wizengamot, he sensed that all the victims forgiving Lupin gave him a very good chance of being released.

It was not James Potter that had convinced him, but Severus Snape. It was so simple and clearcut when Severus said as headmaster Albus was responsible for what occurred at the school. Some things were beyond his control, but Albus did admit Remus Lupin to the school knowing he was a werewolf. He arranged for the whomping willow, the Shrieking Shack, Madam Pomfrey escorting him out there and leaving, and thought his plan was all set. Albus did not count on students discovering the secret, nor on Remus Lupin feeling a stronger loyalty to his friends than to those that could be in danger. He also did not factor in that there could be a student, especially in Gryffindor, that would be so vindictive to use someone he claimed was his friend as a means to kill another student.

Actually, Albus still believed that Sirius Black had somehow tricked the Sorting Hat into placing him in Gryffindor. Once there, he used his charm and maybe a few gifts to poison others so years of brave Gryffindors were turned into self-indulgent bullies. There were still attacks on the female students and the youngest, and it was clear that new methods were needed to deal with that.

****************************

Lily was more than ready to go home on Friday. She could see the difference they were making at the Moonshine residence, but it was on unimportant things. There was no potions work going on except for what the Potions Master brewed, and he was filling orders for his customers.

At Saturday's breakfast, there was an owl from Mary and a newspaper for Lily, and then two more owls arrived. One for each of them.

"Wow," Lily said, "maybe our Defense teacher has already been found and we'll know what book we'll need."

"I hope it's not a lot."

"Maybe it'll be someone who wants us to pass our NEWTs, Sev."

"We're better off starting our own Defense study group. Fifth years and up, so we can snag Crouch by mentioning we're helping anyone studying for their OWL too."

"He's in Slytherin."

"It's not only Ravenclaws that achieve OWLs. Besides, he can write his mother and she'd find someone to supply a study guide for the tests. She knows all those Ministry people."

"He'd do that?"

"When reminded. Maybe he's come to his senses and is not going to sit an OWL in every subject."

"How does he make it to all those classes? Some are at the same time."

"Haven't we talked about this before? I don't think he does. Perhaps if he is not able to meet some teachers outside their normal classes, he can attend every other class so he gets to one a week in the elective subjects."

"That's a lot of special arrangements. Why would they do that?"

"His father, Lily."

"Oh, right," she replied with a shake of her head over the blatant favoritism. She looked at her school letter and the pin that dropped out, exclaiming, "I'm Head Girl!"

"Oh, Lily," Mrs. Evans replied, matching her daughter's enthusiasm.

Lily stopped beaming when she looked at Severus. He did not say anything but he was holding up a different pin. His was mostly green. "You're Head Boy?"

Severus' face changed to a look of disbelief, "Unless they've been keeping all the student killings out of the newspaper. I'm not a prefect, and Slughorn would get himself a transfer student from some dodgy school in Tasmania to nominate before me."

"Oh," Lily muttered in defeat. "This is a terrible prank."

"Why can't Severus be Head Boy?" Mrs. Evans asked. "You've said he's really bright."

"It's not that, mum. Prefects become Head Boys and Girls. And Sev's right, they would need to be nominated by their head of house, and his doesn't like him because he doesn't buy him gifts. He's a real … loser, who uses his position to solicit things for his own benefit. He gains nothing with Severus because Severus won't reciprocate with a thank you gift. Sev's got rich classmates in his house that would be better choices for that reason. Not that they are better students."

"You don't think you're Head Girl then?"

"If my letter came at the same time as Sev's, I don't think so. Besides, there's two female prefects in my year who I think get better grades than me. This is so mean. If we didn't know better, I'd have pinned this on my robe and made a fool of myself on the train going back to school."

"You still could get the real letter, dear. How many girls are eligible?"

"Four. There were only three boys because my house's male prefect got sent to prison."

Severus did not feel like pointing out that Lupin had lost the job prior to that. It was one thing to play stupid pranks on him, but the change of Lily's whole demeanor when she realized hers was probably fake too was heart-rending.

Further depression set in when Lily read, and then aloud to him and Mrs. Evans, "Potter's been moved onto the active team. One of the Cannons' chasers has some magical malady that has him steering headfirst into trees when he's flying."

"That's an odd one," Severus commented. "I wonder how much that cost Potter."

"Cost?"

"If you want someone creatively hexed or cursed, there are wizards who do it for a fee, Lily."

"That's illegal and wouldn't they take it off at St. Mungo's?"

Severus sighed. Of course, it was only coincidence that this occurred, and he was being paranoid thinking that Potter was anything but an extremely talented quidditch player who never dreamed of breaking rules or laws.

"Well?"

"What?"

"I asked why can't St. Mungo's sort it, Sev?"

"Because whoever cast it does not want it cured immediately. If everything had an instant cure, there would be no need for beds at the hospital. When a spell like that is devised, the reverse is purposely difficult. First, it would have to be identified as a malignant spell, rather than something else."

"At least he's alive so they can cure it. I suppose that's the lucky part."

"It could be not playing for the Cannons is the lucky part."

Redirected momentarily from phoenix tears and Dumbledore, Severus spent his Saturday in Diagon Alley investigating other things and returned to Lily's home that night, rather than for Sunday dinner when he was expected next.

"Sev, what are you doing here?"

"I got you something."

"What?"

"Well, it's a long explanation, but I remembered when you told me that story when we were younger how muggles think that vampires are repelled by crosses."

"Yeah?"

"I think I found Potter's repellent," he stated as he handed Lily a pin.

"The Wigtown Wanderers? Helen's team?"

"You don't like that team?"

"No … um, if I followed a team, I guess I'd like the Wanderers. I'd never dislike Helen's team."

"You don't think Potter would find that offensive? He plays for the Cannons. Therefore, everyone must become a Chudley Cannons fan immediately."

Lily giggled, "Right. He'd just think I didn't know better. Whenever he and Pettigrew were spouting off about quidditch, anyone who didn't agree was told they didn't know what they were talking about."

"But you will. I got these," Severus handed Lily a copy of The Wonder of the Wigtown Wanderers and Beating the Bludgers - A Study of Defensive Strategies in Quidditch. "Chasers are offense so you become an expert on why defense is the key to winning."

"Study quidditch?" Lily asked, making a face.

"I got tickets too, so it's not all books, Lily. Here's a pair a tickets for any game they have between now and when school starts so we can go to their games, if you want."

"I understand the annoying Potter bit, but do you have something bigger in mind, Sev?"

"Perhaps. It'll take some work on your part, and it would only be effective if Potter stays on the active team for the next few months."

"How bad is it?"

"In what way bad? I thought of a way that you could let Potter know where your true loyalties lie, in case he doesn't come round and see that pin. Oh, could you wear it a lot?"

"I suppose. I mean, if it's in memory of Helen, I definitely will."

"Before I forget, I also got one for MacDonald, but you'll need to send it to her. She'll get the wrong idea if she thinks it's a gift from me."

"Why?"

"She sends your letter to arrive on Saturday. I get mine on Sundays, and it's best I do nothing more than write back infrequently 'I got your letters'."

"Alright," Lily replied, taking the second pin. "So what's the plan?"

"There's only a plan if you want to invest the time in it, Lily. I think you will need to be a fan for the entire next year so you don't disappoint anyone."

"What do you mean?"

"I think you should form a fan club at Hogwarts. Write now, and ask Prof. McGonagall to sponsor it. She gets annoyed at Slughorn often enough that if things work out just right, we will be ready to spring our surprise on Potter at the Cannons vs. Wanderers match in early October."

"We're in school then."

"I know. That's why we need someone who can argue why any Wanderers fan in the club should be allowed to go since Slughorn took most of Slytherin to a Wasps game last year. It's a big 'if' because the hardest part is Potter's. We need him still playing on the active team."

"But what about tickets?"

"My research has turned up that Chudley Cannons home matches are poorly attended, even though they are the lowest priced quidditch tickets available to encourage whole families to attend and make a day of it. A block of tickets to that game would be available at a further reduced group rate."

Lily laughed, then said, "I'm sorry. I just can't imagine Potter's pride allowing him to play for such a team."

Smirking, Severus stated, "That's why we're Wigtown Wanderer fans, rather than Chudley Cannons fans."

"So you want me to start a club?" Lily asked with her voice expressing doubt.

"Yes, but it won't be hard. We go to these games, and then you can talk about the games you saw over the summer. You can ask Madam Hooch to talk to the club about quidditch strategy. I'm not sure what team she follows, but I don't think she'll hold your love for the Wanderers against you when you bring Parkin into the conversation. Then this author, Whisp, is a huge follower of the Wanderers. Write him to see if he'll speak to the club. Just wait until you have enough members so we don't embarrass anyone by just you and I showing up.

"Here's the important thing, Lily. Do not let anyone know you are doing this because of Potter."

"No, it's … you know, I should have become a Wanderers fan months ago for Helen. Bugging Potter will just make it nicer. This won't effect his income though, will it?"

"No, but it may motivate him to do something reckless and publicly enough to get tossed off the team, if the Cannons can afford to do that."

"Why not? I mean Potter's not that good."

"No, it's just that they may not have any players willing to play chaser for them."

Lily laughed. This could be a lot of fun, and at the same time, cheer her up because since Helen's death, she felt not enough had been done, especially about Sirius Black.

Severus returned home to read feeling pleased. He had been mostly truthful with Lily, and this would give her something to motivate her since the summer work was disappointing and the Head Girl joke was so cruel. Lily wasn't used to people being cruel to her, especially anonymously from a distance so she couldn't retaliate. What he had not mentioned was that the Cannon pitch was modestly sized, since it had not been a winning team in decades. Buying every available ticket for that one game at a group rate would be a pittance for the Lestrange, or Snape, vault. He'd have to have his solicitor write something nice about hearing about the club and Parkin, and include the stack of tickets. Most seats would be empty, but the ones that were filled were likely to hold Wigtown fans. Severus knew that teams and fans really chafed when their seats were filled by hordes of Manchester fans. Their management liked it because they were finally able to sell some tickets. It was an amusing thought to strike Potter through quidditch. He took a deep breath and wiped the smile from his face. It was unlikely that this plan would even result in anything, other than the nuisance of paying attention to the Wigtown Wanderers.

Lily felt enthusiastic and immediately wrote a letter to Prof. McGonagall about her desire to start a Wigtown Wanderers fan club at Hogwarts, in memory of Helen. She also inquired about the Head Girl position. In case it was a secret for some reason, she simply asked if one had been chosen yet.

They were back at Moonshine's when an owl carrying Prof. McGonagall's reply reached Lily.

"Hey Sev, um, we're Head Boy and Head Girl. I got to write mum. Also, Prof. McGonagall says she'd be pleased to sponsor a Wigtown Wanderers fan club at Hogwarts."

"Does she say why? I mean about us being Head Boy and Head Girl, not quidditch."

"No, she asked if we got our letters … I guess I should reply to her first. You didn't throw away your badge, did you?"

"No, I was trying to figure out if it was cursed."

Lily laughed. Of course, Severus was testing it for ill-omened spells. "Wow … you and me."

"Don't you have something about the fickle finger of fate in Divination?"

Thoughtfully, Lily mentioned, "Maybe Slughorn was sacked. I can't believe he'd let you be Head Boy. Should we send him some sort of joke gift?"

"Let's wait a little bit. Maybe if this quidditch thing moves along, you could write him and other professors a heartfelt letter concerning your tribute to Parkin, and send each of them a Wigtown badge. Slughorn may resent that you send him the same as others, but he won't be able to publicly complain that your heart is in the wrong place."

"Sev … you're devious."

"What? Isn't it Slughorn who's always cramming down our throats that appearances are everything? However, you really loved Parkin as a friend, so you are not being devious."

"Of course I love Helen," Lily responded, feeling an itch behind her eyes that she blinked away. Severus understood that. Anyone who said different was looking for a fight with her, and Mary, and Severus, and maybe Malcolm and Evan too.

Later in the day, Severus told her, "None of the matches interfere with mistletoe, so the professor said it's alright for us to go to any quidditch matches."

"Really?" Lily asked. She hadn't even thought about that.

Severus nodded as he concentrated on extracting marrow, then said, "For the club, we may be able to get some prizes for the members. Like for best banner. We'll want them to display the banners at the Cannon match."

Lily sighed resignedly, "They're team symbol's a bit violent. A cleaver."

"For butchering and preparing food, not attacking other people. You like the job the butcher does on your steaks, don't you?"

"Oh yes, they are very nice ones you buy, Sev."

"The house elves at Hogwarts told me what to look for and how to do that sort of preparation. The pot roast your mother makes takes a long time to cook."

"It's inconvenient, but so good."

Severus smiled at the way Lily said that. He knew Lily loved her mother's roast. That was what he originally had in mind till he found out how it was prepared. He doubted he'd get experienced enough to rival Mrs. Evans. Plain steak was quick, and Lily enjoyed it. At least he thought she did since she kept saying she still wanted it for lunch and dinner every day.

Later in the week, Severus was frowning at a letter from his solicitor. He recommended that if Severus wanted to discreetly take possession of any property, Ministry officials would need to be paid for their sensitivity. In another word, a bribe. With a bribe there was no guarantee that once they received their money that they'd carry through with their part of the bargain or for a reasonable amount of time. Was there some way to dump out the contents of the houses and quickly sell them? Or maybe give some of it away to distract anyone that caught on to his windfall? They'd be tying themselves into knots over why, if Severus was completely irrational. They may eventually come upon the correct answer that Severus was an idiot that did not know what to do with money.

Rather than rushing into anything, Severus needed to become conversant regarding wizarding real estate. Moonshine actually had a book on that, and it was still shelved. Wonders never ceased.

Lily caught him reading it, and asked, "Why are you reading that?"

"I don't know any of this. Even if I rent during my apprenticeship, close by in a magical community, there might be things I'm expected to understand."

"Oh." Hesitantly, Lily broached the subject that had been bothering her, "You know, I'm not sure you'd make a lot from selling your house, Sev. Maybe you shouldn't plan on anything till it's sold."

"I'm not selling it yet."

"I think an indoor lavatory is a necessity."

"Alright. I was also thinking electricity. Muggles expect to be able to just stick that thing into the wall."

"It's a plug and it goes into an electrical socket that is wired behind the wall, that all meets up at a sort of control box where the electricity can be turned off for repairs or an emergency, then that hooks up to the utility that delivers it to the house. That's through all those wires on the poles."

Severus looked at Lily. He didn't need to know that, but supposed if he said he was reading a real estate book for extra knowledge that she thought he needed to know how electricity worked, or got into the house or whatever she was babbling about.

When he sold Spinner's End it would be to muggles. His father was fine with the house, but not everyone was Tobias Snape. Their priorities may be different.

At dinner Friday with the Evans, Lily blurted out, "Hey, Prof. McGonagall mentioned that we can do other things as Head Boy and Head Girl for school spirit besides starting that quidditch fan club."

"Like what?" Severus asked, trying to recall any recent attempts by their predecessors.

"I'd like another dance."

"When we talked about the last dance, you recalled that there were ill feelings regarding houses and dating."

"Well, not if not for Valentine's Day. That's too much pressure."

"Does your school have a holiday pantomime?" Mr. Evans asked.

Severus said, "They used to have every year, but it got out of hand with the Great Hall being set on fire."

"When was that?" Lily asked.

"Years ago, but it was monumentally disastrous with a packed infirmary."

"You don't necessarily need a date for a fancy dress party," Mrs. Evans suggested. "That's also fun for young people to attend with their friends as a group, but single attendees can be encouraged with prizes."

"You and dad go to them sometimes. Don't they have themes?"

"Well Tarts and Vicars is always popular, but not for school-age children."

"Vicars might confuse them," Severus commented. He was not interested in having a dance. Even if Lily said she'd go with him, the last one had been such a disaster. Dressing up also sounded like more trouble than it was worth.

"Halloween," Lily stated. "What day of the week is that?"

Predictably, Mrs. Evans popped up and went into the kitchen to answer Lily's demand. "Monday."

"Maybe we can have it Saturday night before Halloween. If there's no quidditch match that day, that'll give everyone time. I bet with magic, we all can get really creative, and we'll have to have a rule about _finite_."

"Will you be able to take pictures?"

"I don't know, mum. What do you think, Sev?"

"How much would we have to do?"

"I don't know, but it'll be the staff taking care of most of it, and Hogwarts always does a lot for Halloween so I don't think it'll be a bother. What should I go as? I need to be someone really heroic."

"Boudicca," Severus suggested.

"Who?"

"Celtic warrior queen who led her people against the Romans after they raped her two daughters."

Lily made a face and Severus added, "I thought you said heroic, and besides she was a leader and a warrior with a just cause."

"Why do most of the heroes have to be men? I refuse to be a damsel in distress for you, Sev."

"I hadn't suggested anything of the sort. You can be a man, if you want. There's a potion for that."

"What?"

Severus shrugged, "Conversely, I could be female, but you don't have to decide now. It's only an idea. Since Prof. McGonagall suggested a school spirit whatever, see what she thinks first. There may have been an incident that I hadn't heard of regarding fancy dress parties."

"Well, if we can have one. We need really good costumes, Sev. I want to win a prize."

"Alright," he agreed. He'd consider anything where he was not embarrassed a success. Even if there was something about casting _finite_, someone was going to do it, just because they were told not to. Probably the genius that attended dressed as a Hogwarts students or a quidditch player. Additionally, if there was a dance, once the staff took over the preparations, it could become a huge disappointment when compared to whatever spectacle Lily was imagining.

*******************************

They were back at Moonshine's when two owls arrived, one for each of them. Mary MacDonald wanted them both to know her fantastic news. The MacDonald solicitor had informed her that her good fortune was due in part to them, along with Wilkes and Rosier, that the settlement from Lupin would go solely to Mary and the Parkin family. The four of them would sign documents absolving Lupin if the other two parties were satisfied.

"What?" Lily asked, looking at Severus who was scowling at his letter.

"I think MacDonald was drinking. Her letter goes on and on …"

"What about?"

"Nothing much," Severus replied. It was about what MacDonald and him could do together. The two of them.

"So this will leave us free to really annoy Potter then?"

"Within reason, right?"

"Right, Sev."

"The quidditch thing … you are doing that for Helen. That's what makes you better."

"We got our first game this afternoon."

"Yes."

"Aren't you excited, Sev?"

"I am if you enjoy it, Lily."

Lily tsk'ed at Severus. That again. She thought about what she definitely knew Severus liked. Well, he'd like seeing Potter go into a monumental toerag fit.

*******************************

Minerva was pleased. She knew Evans was the absolutely right choice for Head Girl. Mr. Snape may not have many original thoughts of his own, but he would support his friend's plans. So far, Miss Evans had written to petition for the formation of a Wigtown Wanderers fan club, in honor of Helen Parkin, a formal Defense study group for fifth, sixth and seventh years, and now asked about holding a fancy dress party the Saturday before Halloween, open to all students. She outlined her ideas regarding prizes and the fancy dress aspect possibly putting less emphasis on dates, and more on friends.

Her mood darkened when she reached Albus' office and found Albus and Horace having one of their teas. Horace missed their last staff meeting, barely responded to correspondence, but had time to chum up to the headmaster to set things right. The head of Slytherin was a vital position. Those students were most prone to get up to dire things due to lack of supervision, and the rumors regarding He Who Must Not Be Named recruiting from that house in particular needed someone's focus where it should be.

"Minerva, would you care to join us?" Albus asked.

"Yes, I'm happy to see Horace here. I received another letter from Miss Evans, and I think you'll love this idea."

"Me?" Albus asked.

"Oh yes. You excel at this sort of thing, Albus. She asked about a fancy dress party for all the students. Doubtlessly, you can come up with a dazzling array of prizes for Best Dressed, Most Beautiful, Most Original and such. She mentioned that with a fancy dress party that students may not feel pressured to find dates, and could attend with friends, or even on their own if they want to keep their costume idea secret."

Albus was already thinking about the possibilities, when Horace's question interrupted his thoughts, "Why's Evans bothering us with that nonsense?"

"She's Head Girl, Horace. I asked her to think of some ideas regarding school spirit."

"Head Girl? Where was I?"

"We traditionally discuss the positions at the last staff meeting of the year, Horace, when all the grades are finalized. I believe you had some emergency."

Albus added, "I took care of it, Horace, and counted your votes for your prefects."

"Evans, huh? Is Wilkes Head Boy? He may have completely different ideas about school spirit. You can't just promote your girl, Minerva."

"Pfft, no, Horace, I'm not. I'm sure Miss Evans has discussed her plans with the Head Boy, but I can always write him to confirm he is not deadset against them. So far, Miss Evans only wrote about forming a fan club and a study group, but she's picking up speed."

"A fan club?" Horace laughed. "For what?"

"The Wigtown Wanderers."

"That's a quidditch team," Horace scoffed.

"Indeed," Minerva replied.

"Albus, surely you aren't going to allow something like that," Horace protested. "Armando put a halt to all that with ..."

"I am well aware of Headmaster Dippet's policies regarding the fervor regarding quidditch. At Hogwarts, we limit it to house loyalties, however Miss Evans sentiments regarding her application for this particular fan club with Prof. McGonagall's support are for the right reasons. I am allowing it, and will review any application for a rival professional quidditch team's fan club here at Hogwarts while the Wanderers continue to have one."

"It'll be anarchy in the halls, Albus," Horace predicted.

"I'm sure that if it gets out of hand, Horace, that we'll deal with it," Minerva replied in annoyance. Horace just strolled, and started trying to change things.

"Well, don't come crying to me then. I'll only say I told you so. You weren't here back in the 1920s and early 1930s …"

"Oh, put a sock in it, Horace." Fifty years ago. Besides, Minerva thought, they should be lucky if students today limited themselves to quidditch rivalries, rather than blood status and attacking any female who caught their eye.

Albus used Horace's gasp at Minerva's effrontery to return to the topic that caught his interest, "A fancy dress party? My, it has been a long time since one of those."

"Miss Evans suggested the Saturday before Halloween since the school is already decorated."

"You know, I remember when I dressed as Pan back when I was younger. Elphias was Faunus. What a pair we made."

"So you are in favor of it, Albus?"

"Oh definitely. Even though it excites me to think up what I'll wear, I can't wait to see what the students think up. I'm sure Miss Evans and Mr. Snape will have terrific ensembles, given they undoubtedly have already given it some thought."

Horace shook his head miserably. Snape. Evans kept making a huge mistake associating with that young man. Another 'I told you so' in the making. How unlucky she was to live so close to him that she lacked proper companionship of students her own age. She had such promise when she was younger, and she didn't take all this for granted. That gleam in her eye, and that questing thirst for knowledge. All thrown away. Poetically, he could compare Severus Snape to an anchor, holding Evans back. All he was fit for was cleaning up after his betters. That's why Filch liked him. As if it mattered what a squib thought.

*******************************

From the outset, Lily was reminded why she was here. There was a Parkin on the team. He was an older man and a beater, but it gave Lily an instant connection to why she liked the Wigtown Wanderers. If Helen were alive, she'd be at the game today. That's how she spent her holidays, watching and cheering for her team.

The announcing at the professional quidditch game was more … professional than it was at Hogwarts. The commentary is what made games between Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw interesting to watch. The Wanderers were not a bad team. They didn't do anything against the rules. Lily would never be able to support a team that intentionally cheated.

Severus surprised her with a gift of omnioculars. They told the names of the plays, when she played them back. Lily could learn the finer points of quidditch faster with these, rather than the squiggly diagrams in a book.

When they returned to Moonshine's, Severus suggested Lily take it easy, and review the game, while he went and worked on a greenhouse till it got too dark. She mildly protested that she could help, but frankly, Lily was tired of all this work around here. In any case, Sev was rather good at working alone. He was good at starting and working at something till it was done. Lily sort of admired it, but for herself, it was no fun. Around here, once one thing was finished, there was always something else. If she could finish something and be totally done, that would be different.

When she got home, she talked to her parents, and they had put together a tentative calendar for August, that also included Lily's Wigtown games that she gave the dates to her mum for. They didn't play too much so it was not a problem. Lily could miss one of their games, and thought Sev would understand because he probably got all the tickets because he did not know when they were going to the United States.

Lily's muggle passport came, that was ordered through the Ministry. With magic, she thought she'd have a good picture, rather than this. When she demanded to see Sev's, she laughed. He looked less happy in his picture, than she did in hers, which Lily had not thought possible.

However, Lily did have a surprise for Severus. Her dad had gotten a pair of tickets to the Manchester vs. Liverpool game based on her request that he find something in that timeframe between them working and going to Walt Disney World. Her dad had been disappointed that they'd be back in school before Manchester played the Derby Rams, but Lily could not use magic to change football schedules to suit her father.

"Look what I got, Sev," she said waving them excitedly.

He had to wait till the flapping stopped to actually see what Lily had. He said, "Those are football tickets."

"Yeah, to see your team."

"There's two of them."

"Can't I go as your date?"

"Uh, yes, you can."

"You don't sound happy, Sev."

"It's unexpected."

"You are doing so much for me, Sev. You walk to the store every day, get steaks for me, cook them, got me Wigtown tickets, omnioculars, you didn't argue over a fancy dress party … I can go see a football game. Maybe I'll really love it."

"As long as you don't confuse it with quidditch."

"I think I can handle that. And um, I have this calendar for August … see right here is our Manchester game, and all the Wigtown games are on it too, and I think this week is the best week for us to get our portkeys and make our hotel reservation."

"This is not your handwriting."

"Mum's excited about going. And when I talked to Tunie on the phone, she's green with envy."

"You saw the green through the telephone?"

"Absolutely."

"You did not pick this destination to annoy Petunia?"

"Oh, like you are worried about her feelings?"

"I am supposed to be nice and civil to Petunia Evans Dursley. Strict orders. If you are hurting her feelings, I may have to reprimand you."

"Stop kidding around. No, I want to go here. Ever since … oh, I think I saw something on telly before I went to Hogwarts when they were still building it. I was so upset it was going to be so far away. It was like they were teasing me by showing it."

Severus was sure he had good memories of their childhood conversations. He did not recall Lily expressing any burning desire to visit the United States, except she wanted to go surfing in California. She had given him a demonstration with a sheet of plywood balanced against a large rock, and showed him some pictures in a magazine. Florida was on the other side of the country, and from what Severus was able to find out, it was a swamp. He did not know much about surfing, but there were no waves in a swamp.

"What's wrong?" Lily asked.

"Nothing."

"When you were young wasn't there anyplace you really wanted to go?"

Severus frowned. Yeah, Hogwarts. Look at how that turned out. He had used his imagination constantly picturing the school and how wonderful it would be when he got there, based on mother's descriptions. He'd learn a lot, be very bright, become a powerful, respected wizard and have lots of friends.

*******************************

A workable substitute for unicorn lung!

With the initial success, Joe Rue danced around his lab.

After the second test, Joe ran out into the street and danced with the first person he met.

The third time, just to be sure because this was huge, Joe whooped and laughed till he had tears coming out of his eyes.


	45. Chapter 45 The Quill is Mightier

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 45 The Quill is Mightier ...

Wigtown Wanderers were their only breaks in addition to weekends away from the gradually repaired Moonshine household. Severus had overheard Tess defending her apprenticeship terms to Lily. Tess was a Hufflepuff idiot for saying she'd wait till the children were in Hogwarts to get back to serious study. They weren't her children. They weren't even her Potions Master's children. For all she knew, more children could be dropped off and they'd never be gone.

Perhaps Severus was fortunate that he was not following the customary route and letting Slughorn recommend him to a Potions Master. That way non-customary terms could be introduced to the apprenticeship agreement for him to terminate it, if there was lack of teaching. Severus was not opposed to repetitive and necessary work, such as ingredient preparation, but if he never got to brew anything with a portion of the ingredients, whatever Potions Master thought that was a dandy arrangement was going to regret it. Even if Severus had to originally beg for the position.

He also had to keep reminding Lily that weeks, then only days were left. Moonshine was pleased with their work. Keeping him pleased, which was better than merely satisfied, was preferable to Lily telling him what she thought of him. To the Potions community at large, Moonshine was respectable. The two of them needed someone respectable. Severus for Potions, and he knew Healers respected the field of Potions so a recommendation for Lily would carry weight. Any brainless, sycophantic cherub with dimples bestowing gifts could get Slughorn's recommendation.

Lily, on the other hand, was feeling great. She was still stuck here, but with Severus. Their constant togetherness was quite enjoyable. Sometimes, they'd work on separate things during the day, but it was an equitable split, in her eyes. Severus was accommodating and would work on whatever Lily hated most.

Their evenings were routine, but if Lily suggested doing something different, Severus did not mind. Although, Lily did not vary from the routine much because she always wanted to shower after work, and once she was done with that, she wanted to relax and lounge around in her pajamas listening to the radio, and then Severus would join her and that was brilliant. Even if she agreed with Sev that they shouldn't rock the caravan, it was still brilliant. And what was more bloody brilliant was Lily was not getting bored with Severus and however they brilliantly did various things. That was brilliant, right? Lily knew she lost interest in things, but Sev was … brilliant. Perhaps irreplaceable. Maybe when she got back to school things would return to their former perspective. Out in the middle of nowhere, otherwise known as Mould-on-the-Wold, there was no one else to catch Lily's fancy. Not that there had been a whole individual that caught her fancy, but she had admired pieces of individuals.

She also had a lot things to which to look forward. Lily was getting a better understanding of quidditch and other than Gryffindor, the Wigtown Wanderers were her team. She at least was committed to that for Helen. She was not crazy about quidditch, and she only admitted that because she had seen some lads at school who were. Lily was not going to paint herself dark, blood red and wave a meat cleaver about, like some of the otherwise respectable wizards in the stands at games.

There was also her dream trip to Walt Disney World, and it was getting closer. All four of them now had passports, even Severus. The portkeys had arrived, and they were at her house and ready for them at the proper time. The Ministry had even labeled the rubbish nicely with the date and time for each one. They also had a reservation for the hotel. That had been a sticky subject with her parents, but Severus expressed no objections to sleeping wherever. Another rollaway in one room with two beds. Lily got a bed, and her parents got the other bed. Lily could easily afford a second room, but they wanted to keep an eye on her. Besides, she didn't want to get into it when they asked how she thought they could afford a second room. Ugh! If Disney World was not so exciting, maybe Lily wouldn't have invited them in the first place. Speaking of money, Sev had already given her father some muggle cash. Lily did not know how much, and had been totally left out of whatever conversation 'the men' had. She understood her dad had to use his credit card to reserve the room, and felt that agreed it was better to use that then carrying cash or even traveler's checks for the large hotel bill that was expected. From what her father had been saying, the Polynesian Resort was a pricey place to stay.

One night, Lily had spent a while, laying next to Severus, thinking about money. Specifically Severus'. They were getting paid for this, but not yet. Severus had bought their quidditch tickets, a couple of books for her and the omnioculars. He was also buying groceries, and Lily suspected her steaks were the costliest thing he bought each trip. Severus also paid a share of their hotel or whatever he worked out with her dad, the portkeys and his passport fee. He couldn't have much more left, but he had merely shrugged when she had bothered him about getting new clothes for their trip since it was supposed to be hot there. Even worn out cotton jumpers were going to be too heavy, even if Severus was used to it. They were supposed to go to the store, the muggle department store in town, this coming Monday afternoon. Lily wanted to be sure Severus had the right things, but now worried that all this was going to leave him with as little as he had before. She really hoped Sev didn't have his hopes up to sell the house in Spinner's End for any reasonable amount of money. The town should just bulldoze all of those houses down and put up nice ones.

After they finally said their farewell to Regulus Moonshine and departed with their galleons, Lily fairly skipped away from his house. They had the rest of the month off since their homework was completed a while ago, though Sev was working on some arithmancy thing that was using up a lot of parchment. The caravan was crowded once a couple of those thick books of numerical tables joined them. And Lily had remembered to restore the caravan to its original configuration of two hard sofa beds with a table in between. Though after all that initial fuss about her being a girl, it was all for nothing. No one had ever bothered them out there.

Severus was a bit annoyed that Lily was bouncing around with excitement to get out of Mould-on-the-Wold. She could have contained herself till they apparated, and were safely out of sight. He knew she was happy. All week, Lily had been talking about the rest of their summer holiday. Tomorrow was only their Manchester United game, then Monday was clothes shopping for the big trip. It wasn't until Lily was agitated one night and talked for two hours about this American place that he truly realized how much she wanted to go there. It did not seem possible to squeeze in all she wanted to do in one week. He really had no idea what she was talking about, and doubted the hand gestures she was making in the dark as he felt her waving her arms in the air would help him picture what a spinning tea cup was, or something about talking mice and ducks. He understood what a princess was, and Lily told him about Cinderella, who's castle was the focal point in that picture. The story bothered him. Severus was not Prince Charming. In his mind, he used to imagine all sorts of fanciful things about being the Half-Blood Prince, but charming and handsome, never. Was the fancy dress party supposed to be like that ball, and Lily expected her eyes to meet the eyes of her prince, and they'd fall instantly in love before they even said one word to each other? Severus really should give their costumes more thought, rather than let Lily babble out her ideas while he half-listened. A good disguise did not necessarily mean Lily had to look glamorous, seductive or anything even remotely attractive.

At Friday night dinner at the Evans, Lily kept talking. She talked so much she got beyond the summer holiday and talked about Hogwarts. She wanted to make a huge mark on the school as Head Girl. Some sort of legacy. If Slytherins were ambitious, what was Lily the Gryffindor? Severus had no inclination in that direction at all as Head Boy. He still didn't think he'd stay Head Boy till September so why waste any time on it? Some prank where he'd sputter impotently when the Headmaster informed him it was all a mistake with that fake look of kindness that Dumbledore had developed over the years?

It was Lily that was sputtering afterwards, when Severus suggested that he come over later on Saturday because they were going to the football game. For the past several weeks, he had done one meal a day at the Evans – Friday dinner, Saturday breakfast, Sunday dinner and Monday breakfast. With the change of schedule tomorrow, he could come later and they could leave for the match then. He wanted to work on some things of his own, rather than listening to Lily reiterate her plans and ideas. When they went on vacation, he'd see this indescribable wonderland for himself. For the moment, Severus felt he had no knowledge of what Lily was attempting to describe. It was not avoiding her if he saw her every day.

Lily conceded that Severus was right. It was kind of funny that she was trying to hold him to a schedule, when she was the one always wanting change and excitement. She doubted Manchester United would provide it, but it was something she wanted to do for Severus. Lily was not sure what she could do in return for Severus sometimes, when he was making an effort for her.

They did go to the Manchester vs. Liverpool game, and Lily found it boring. Actually, this could be a day to go down in history because she found football to be more boring than quidditch. Well, she was actually starting to care more about quidditch that who won or lost, but that was different. What Lily did enjoy was watching Severus.

He had been quiet, but as soon as the game began, Severus leaned forward in his seat and intently watched. Like he was keeping an eye on a tricky potion he was brewing. Unlike the other Manchester fans, Severus seemed subdued. He did make some jerky motions when something extremely favorable occurred, but he did not jump out of his seat, shout and throw things.

Lily was surprised by the continual attention he gave to the game. From his stated contentment that he had the action written down in a magic notebook, Lily surmised that watching the actual game was not a worthwhile pursuit for him. However, it appeared that Severus found football fascinating.

After all that, Lily was stunned that the game ended with a tie zero to zero. Maybe if there was some scoring, she would have found something worth watching.

Then Severus started talking about everything about the game, and even though it was only the first game of the new season, games against Liverpool meant something because the two teams had some sort of history. It was nice to see Severus excited, but Lily did not need him to recap anything, she had been there sitting next to him after all.

At least they were walking while he talked so they could apparate back to Lily's house once they were out of sight of any muggles. Lily wondered if her dad knew about the rivalry between the two teams, or just bought whatever tickets were available between now and when school started.

The back door was locked. Why did mum lock it? She knew they'd be home after the game.

"I didn't bring a key, Sev. What's that spell?"

Shaking his head slightly, Severus chided Lily, "After all that study to find every hidden room at Hogwarts, you can't remember a first year charm to unlock a door?"

"It's aloha something. I remember it because they say hello and good-bye Hawaii by saying aloha."

"It's _alohomora_," Severus replied. He did not cast it since it was not polite to unlock other people's houses without permission. Lily was capable of unlocking her own door.

"Right." With a flourish of her wand, Lily cast the charm and the lock audibly clicked. She opened the door, calling, "Mum?" With no answer, Lily took over the conversation, "Hey, that's an idea. We didn't find anything good, but with a whole year of looking in our spare time, we're bound to find something great."

"If you want."

"Where could she be?"

"Your mother is allowed to leave the house, but it looks like the car's still here," Severus replied from next to the window. "We should stay downstairs."

"Why?" she asked, before calling, "Mum! Dad!"

He made a face at her, then explained, "In case they are upstairs."

Lily in the kitchen doorway, looking into the dining room and beyond. "So?"

"They may have thought we'd be out longer."

"What's that got to do with anything? It's afternoon, and why isn't anything cooking out here?" Lily asked as she returned to the kitchen.

"Your mother may have intended to get to preparing dinner afterwards."

"After what?"

"Whatever they normally do when you are not home."

"What are you trying to say, Sev? They don't take naps … Oh! Sev, how could you think that? They're my parents."

He shrugged as he turned away from her to go back to gazing out the window. Severus forgot that a stork brought Petunia, and Lily was found under a cabbage leaf.

"Do you think they really still … they don't have to, you know. They have Petunia and I, and mum's too old now." After a pause, Lily suggested, "We could watch telly. Maybe they will hear it, and then could act like they were … um, doing nothing upstairs."

Severus rolled his eyes while he was still facing away from Lily, before replying, "Whatever you want is fine, Lily."

"Come on. I don't know what's on right now, but it will all be new to you."

Following, he made a face. How much television did Lily watch that it would not be new to her also?

Lily did not like anything that was on and flipped through the channels a second time, saying, "If you see something that interests you, say so Sev."

She felt she had the volume moderately loud that her parents should hear them so they'd quickly get dressed and get down here. Lily looked at Severus who said nothing and asked, "Which one?"

"They're all new to me so why don't you pick?"

What kind of answer was that? Was Sev being a smart ass? Two could play at that. Lily turned it back to something that appeared to be a contemporary drama with a lot of talking heads. It was not as boring as the football game. Lily impatiently gave the show some of her attention while she waited.

During the station break, she asked, "What if they aren't upstairs?"

"Maybe they went for a walk ..." Severus amended it at the look Lily gave him, "... or they walked to someplace nearby. Would someone have picked them up?"

"No, dad likes to drive so he can leave whenever he wants."

Severus had begun to suspect the Evans were not upstairs, but he thought Lily would know better than he would where they could be.

When the telephone rang, Lily shot off the couch and ran to answer it.

"Hello."

"Lily?"

"Petunia?"

"Yes, mum's at the hospital with dad. She wanted me to keep calling till you got home."

"What's wrong with dad?"

"Mum didn't know yet when she got me. They're running tests. He had chest pains. Could be he overate or his heart."

Lily made a face. Her dad was as healthy as an ox. Never been sick a day in his life, and even had perfect attendance awards from work. Probably had mum whip him up a couple knickerbocker glories.

"I should head to hospital then?"

"You should. If it's bad, mum will need you. Vernon's ready to drive me, but it's a long ride. I didn't want us to set out and get there to find out it was for nothing. If mum can't call me back, call me collect."

"Collect?"

Tunie's sigh was brief and she explained, "Dial the operator and say you want to charge the call to my telephone. Take my phone number with you."

"I know to take your number," Lily replied.

"I know, but if you left in a hurry, I didn't want you to get there and realize you left it at home."

"Alright, um, I better get going," Lily said and hung up the phone. Severus was already standing nearby. He had overheard hospital mentioned.

"My dad got sick, Sev. That was Petunia to tell me to meet mum there, and then call her."

"Alright."

"I need um … Tunie's phone number and … um, I guess that's it."

"Alright. Is the back door locked from earlier?"

"Can you check that, and I'll turn off the telly."

"We can apparate. I know which building it is."

"Uh, but what if we're seen?"

"It's getting dark, and muggles don't always see things."

Lily was still making up her mind when Severus grabbed her arm and took them both to outside the hospital. "Sev … you shouldn't just do that."

"Was there a reason to delay further?"

"No, but … where's the entrance?"

"Around the side. I didn't want to bring us to right in front of it."

Lily started off towards the door, but slid her hand into Severus' rather than letting him follow at his own pace.

Severus allowed Lily to lead and talk. He had never been inside anyplace so … muggle. He realized he was born here, but the lack of magic did not bother him then. There was a lot of muggle science equipment. The atmosphere along with the floors, lighting, walls, ceilings … all of it was intrinsically different than St. Mungo's somehow. There was even a sort of smell to the place.

Lily found her mother and let go of Severus' hand to clasp her mum's. "What's going on?" she asked.

"Your father's in surgery. The vessels around his heart are blocked so they are doing some bypass thing."

"His heart? But wouldn't he have had symptoms?" Lily inquired.

"Well … you know your father …" Mrs. Evans replied.

"Did he have a heart attack?"

"They think so."

"But heart attacks are for unfit people."

Severus would not define Mr. Evans as fit, but he did not want to become part of this conversation. He knew little about muggle methods regarding health and medicine. He'd rather leave here, but supposed he should wait in case Lily or Mrs. Evans needed something. It's not that he especially wanted to, especially with them both appearing … emotional. It was appropriate for the circumstances, but Severus did not like displays of whatever they could do. Very discomforting.

When they reached a lull where they both looked forlorn, he blurted out, "Petunia."

"Oh, Tunie wanted to be called," Lily remembered. "Um, should I? Or do you …?"

"I'm waiting for the doctor to come out. You call, dear."

"What should I say? She said Vernon could drive her here."

"Uh … I guess that would be the right thing. You can say it's his heart, and that he's in there now."

"Alright, I think I saw phones downstairs. Are there some closer?"

"Yes, around that corner there."

Severus lagged behind Lily to see where she was going, and stood where he could see her on the phone, and also her mother hovering around the door of the waiting room.

Shortly after Lily made the telephone call to her sister, a man came out and broke the news to Mrs. Evans that even though they had done all they could do, it was too late to save her husband.

*********************************

Never having considered Mr. Evans as any sort of father figure to him, Severus found the idea of him dying tolerable. The problems were that Lily was crying, Mrs. Evans was crying, and when they were stopping for breath, they were assuming the roles of muggle medical experts.

When Petunia arrived and started crying, it did not bother Severus since she hung on Vernon, her mother and sister. Their previous relationship was unchanged since she spared Severus a moment to call him 'freak'.

Vernon's original plan was to get some rest and then drive back to Little Whinging tomorrow. He'd return for Petunia next weekend, or some future one based on how things were going. All that was changed. Stoically, he realized that this sudden passing might be better than some long, drawn out affair. A little forewarning would have been nice, but if Vernon were to go, he wouldn't want to be stuck in some hospital bed with tubes, monitors and machines keeping him alive for God knew how long while he withered away to a shadow of his former, fit self. Yes, he'd rather Petunia remember him at his physical prime, rather than some feeble thing in a backless, hospital gown that consumed her time with day-long visits when he had no inkling that his sweet wife was by his side holding his shriveled hand. Unless there was some chance for a complete recovery. Then by all means, hook him up.

Severus was able to take his leave by referring to Phi. His raven could take care of herself, but Severus would rather go home overnight than drink yet another cup of tea. The Evans showed no sign of retiring, and it was well past midnight.

He did return early, in case they stuck to their usual schedule to attend church. Severus was not sure if they needed them, but he had stopped at the local shop to purchase two boxes of the disposable tissues they used at the Evans. Not that he was paying particular attention to them, since the ladies were disposing of them properly, but it was obvious they were being used at a rapid pace.

If no one was up, Severus had considered leaving the bag next to the back door as he walked down Lily's street. They may be sleeping later than usual.

That was not the case though. When he went up the stairs to the back door, Mrs. Evans opened it, saying, "I saw you down the street, Severus. Tea will be ready for you in a sec."

"Thank you, Mrs. Evans." She did not look well. Her clothes were different, but she may have not slept. Her pink eyes could be that way from crying too. As he sat, he heard her sniffling. His eyes darted around. There was no sign of anyone else in the kitchen. Nobody was at the table, no food was waiting on it for someone to come through the door, and there was not even the pot of porridge on the stove. Just the kettle.

When she brought the cup over, she asked, "Would you like me to start porridge? I'm not sure how long you'd have to wait for the others."

"That's alright. I ate something at home," he fibbed. "I did not know if you had enough boxes so I got two for you, so you wouldn't need to go to the market."

Mrs. Evans looked at the tissues. Severus was a strange boy. Thoughtful, but quite odd. "Thank you. That's very considerate, Severus."

Severus only gave a slight nod of acknowledgement while he thought of what he should do next. He could make an excuse to leave. With Vernon here, and living too far away to easily escape, they had someone who could do things for them. Petunia's husband seemed alright last night, rather than having an emotional outburst like the ladies. He also drove, Severus thought while trying to convince himself that he was better off elsewhere. However, he should wait till Lily was up.

While he slowly sipped his tea, Severus hoped someone else would rise soon. Mrs. Evans was hovering, ready to prepare a second cup for him. After yesterday, he'd prefer to limit his tea consumption. He liked tea. But too much was too much.

As time passed, Mrs. Evans was tolerable, all things considered. She did sniffle and blow her nose, but she was not all-out crying right now.

Vernon was the first to make an appearance. Severus considered he may be preferable to his wife, Petunia, and replied with a good morning.

After Mrs. Evans bid Vernon good morning and made some inquiries, she took out a couple pots and pans and got to work on his breakfast. Severus considered that Petunia probably cooked him a large breakfast every morning, so Vernon was not bothering Mrs. Evans for anything he considered out of the ordinary.

Severus was relieved by the satisfied look on Mrs. Evans face as she finished piling the last of the food onto the plate and brought it over to Vernon, who was sipping tea and reading a section of the newspaper folded and placed flat on the table next to his place setting.

Oh no, Lily's newspaper delivery. Mrs. Evans already reached into the jar and counted out five knuts for it. Severus looked at Vernon, who's mouth remained agape, even though he had stopped putting more food into it, as Mrs. Evans opened the window and exchanged something for a rolled up newspaper from an owl. There were two other owls that joined it on the outside window ledge.

"Oh," she muttered, "they're for you, Severus. Um, could I have a piece of that bacon back, Vernon?"

"Don't bother, Mrs. Evans. One's a weekly letter, I'd rather not receive nor encourage." He really rather tell Mary MacDonald to sod off and leave him alone. She should have lots of new friends once that money was in her vault. MacDonald would not need him, and maybe she wouldn't need Lily either.

"Looks like a girl's handwriting," she commented. "The other has bad penmanship."

"It's the girl I don't want writing. She's Lily's friend."

"Did you want to look at Lily's paper before she comes down?"

"Maybe. If she takes a long time, it'll give me something to do while I wait. Unless you need help with something, Mrs. Evans?"

"I'm going to make some telephone calls soon. Don't want to call to early, and last night was too late."

Vernon entered the conversation, "Those were owls."

"They carry letters. Lily has one for that."

"Very inefficient," Mrs. Evans added.

Vernon nodded in agreement.

Since Mrs. Evans did not give him a direct answer regarding something he could do, Severus opened the larger envelope from Prof. Abstractus. Unicorn lung … that was used for an extreme respiratory potion, and in a preventive potion against gas poisoning. Usually anyone needing either one died because the rareness of unicorn lung was complicated by some odd method of harvesting. Was that the one that needed to be removed by a virgin witch with a bronze knife while it was still alive, or maybe that was the heart? Unicorn parts were a particular pain because each organ had a separate method depending on how it was to be used. Most puzzling to Severus was how anyone ever found the 'right' way to collect them. Cutting up unicorns was not the same as experimenting with a vat of flobberworms. At least mistletoe during the full or new moon, cut with a silver knife had Celtic origins. The druids used mistletoe for a wide variety of potions and even spells.

Glancing through Rue's draft, Severus saw nothing wrong with it. He didn't feel like reading it closely. Now he owed Prof. Abstractus a reply.

He looked around. Vernon had recovered enough to resume eating. Mrs. Evans was fussing in front of the stove. Severus listened, but did not hear anyone moving about upstairs.

With a sigh, he opened MacDonald's missive. Pages of big, loopy handwriting. He did not care what MacDonald was planning. He barely had enough capacity to listen to all of Lily's ideas. Like some of Lily's they were vague, future plans about a nice house somewhere nice with nice grounds. MacDonald liked the word 'nice'. Lily's was 'brilliant' for herself, and 'toerag' for anyone who was not her. Sometimes, Severus got to be 'brilliant'. Unfortunately, he only remembered getting that reward for shagging. He'd like to be brilliant for other things, he thought, as he glanced at the envelope from Prof. Abstractus. Why did good things happen to him when someone died?

"Everything alright, Severus?"

He looked at Mrs. Evans. She was asking if he was alright? "Shouldn't I be asking you that, Mrs. Evans?"

"I thought maybe you received some bad news."

Severus shrugged, "I don't enjoy lengthy letters about everything the author thinks of saying. It may be because she's a girl, and I'm not."

Vernon grunted agreement. Petunia was an excellent conversationalist, but there were things he'd rather not know. She was a good listener too. No mistake about that. Every day when he got home from work, she eagerly wanted to know how his day was.

"From a girl?"

"Lily's roommate at school. She studies with us sometimes. With her condition, she's become less popular."

"Lily said Mary fancies you."

"I wouldn't go as far as all that. She knows it would not be appropriate. I think she values her friendship with Lily more, and that's the reason she writes me."

"Not appropriate?" Vernon asked. Petunia said Severus was odd. Well, freak was the word she used. However, wasn't he Lily's friend? Just an old school friend, that lived nearby?

"She was almost betrothed to one of my roommates. It's a drama with a lot of characters. I'm uncomfortable with telling such a tale."

"Mary was?" Mrs. Evans asked.

"Special measures would have to be taken for her to have children due to that attack in the fall so his family soured on it. Besides the other problem."

"I thought you fellows only got Lily's roommates to meet your roommates on the train last September."

"It was Mary's and Helen's idea. Not mine. They were angry at some other boys."

"Getting angry with someone else is no reason to contemplate marriage."

As the silence grew after Mrs. Evans announcement, Severus was contemplating whether he should introduce another subject to keep Mrs. Evans distracted, or let this conversation die since it was trivial.

Vernon took the opportunity to ask, "What happened to her?"

"She was infected with a contagious disease that makes her dangerous at times, and miserable the rest of the time," Severus replied.

"Muggles know what werewolves are, Severus. Mary and Lily were attacked by a werewolf, and Severus saved them."

"A werewolf?" Vernon repeated. "Like full moon and all hairy thing?"

"Yes, Mary was bitten. Lily only clawed up."

"Terrible scars," Mrs. Evans added.

"Couldn't you fix it, like my hand?" Vernon asked Severus.

"Due to it being a werewolf, they're cursed. I was able to stop Mary from bleeding to death. It had bitten off her hand. It would have come back to her, but it was in the middle of devouring Lily's other roommate when we entered the room."

"Are they … common?"

"They increase in number when the ones that are infected choose to flout the law regarding protecting others. This one got sent to prison. He has a wealthy friend that's trying to get him released."

Mrs. Evans exclaimed, "How can he? A girl's dead, and the other two, or I mean Lily's alright with things compared to Mary … but that's ridiculous."

Lily didn't say anything to her mother? "Well, it's not as simple as all that. All of us that were there were offered money to sign a letter saying we forgave him."

"Did you?"

"Not at first. None of us lads were, but Mary said that she would sign it because she was worried about how she'd get by, since employment is difficult to come by for werewolves. She has her parents, but they are not as wealthy as others. So us three and Lily made a counteroffer that we would sign, but Mary would need to receive a very large settlement. The solicitors then took over and it appears that our offer has been accepted. Once we get the paperwork, Mary will get her money, and whatever the Parkin family agreed to, and then the appeal for release from prison can move forward.

"The school made it rather simple for anyone to come across him while he was transformed. I think that the headmaster had promised everything would be taken care of to his parents for him to attend. There's also his friend, that knowing he was a werewolf, invited us to come round to where he was. That student fled the country, but his best friend, who knew about his mate's plan, was the one on your front porch. He's the wealthy friend who is financing the appeal."

"Lily said he is also one of the lads that smashed up the pub?"

"Yes."

"Oh … I'm sorry, Severus. I forgot about the pub," Mrs. Evans said apologetically.

"It's alright. I know you were just using that example to point out the lack of character of that individual."

"And you were agreeable to going along with the release after all they've done?"

"From Potter's appearance here to attempt to convince Lily to revise our opinion, I think our demand's scale got his attention."

"Was it excessive?"

"We looked at it logically since witches usually have a longer life span than non-magical people, and asked for over two million pounds."

"That's a lot of money for a seventeen year old to receive."

"She'd like to buy a house," Severus said, holding up her letter. "Not immediately, but she can afford to be selective, and have it include what she needs to keep herself and others safe."

Mrs. Evans shook her head and made a noise of disapproval. It was small wonder that Lily mentioned marriage. It was not jealousy of her sister alone, but these flighty girlfriends of hers at school. Sometimes Lily talked sensibly about waiting, but her concept of the whole thing was incorrect. Now the one girl that was left was talking about getting her own house. Severus was already living on his own though not by choice. When Lily got angry she threatened to move in with Severus, however Severus was never around when she made such a claim. Her daughter may think her mother was not paying attention to that, but simply because she chose to be a homemaker did not mean she couldn't think for herself. What she thought was that Lily could hot-headedly decide she was moving in with Severus, and he'd agree because that's what usually happened. Then he'd end up preparing steaks for her daughter twice a day as long as he could afford it.

Her husband … without her husband, she did not know how she'd cope. Lily was going back to school in a couple weeks, and Petunia was living so far away. Since the girls had been older for a while, she'd occasionally do activities at church. Some of those women though, just made her so angry. That was unimportant … she simply did not know what she was going to do after this month was over.

*********************************

One did not realize the sacrifices a real reporter sometimes made, Rita thought to herself as she checked her face in the mirror one last time. If there was anyplace she'd rather not go to, it was the Black house, especially as the guest of some geezer. However, the news was not going to write itself.

Through the introductions and drinks, Rita was wondering if she should fake a malady to leave. The only person under the age of a hundred, besides herself, was the hostess' sulking son. The only thing that could save this was more drinks. Lots more drinks to loosen tongues. Her eyes shifted to catch a glimpse of that old punter, Horace Slughorn, slobbering over Walburga Black, rather than the food. How could he remain standing after drinking so much to think she was desirable? Oh wait, rich widow. Money blinded a suitor to imperfections. Black had enough money to look almost as good as Rita herself, to that sort of person.

During dinner the food was being shoveled faster than the liquor was flowing, to Rita's growing disappointment. Their conversation was dull and lacked gossip … until out of the blue, a name Rita recognized was mentioned … down the table, away from the head where Walburga Black and Horace Slughorn were making idle chatter.

Snape? Her head turned to zero in on the source.

The son was answering, "Really, Professor? I am so glad that my advice was so helpful to you."

"Helpful? Mr. Snape and Miss Evans set me on a whole new course of research, in addition to everything they were able to accomplish during their stay. They were mannerly, got along with me, my apprentice and my family, and the house hasn't looked this good since my late wife … well, anyway, I can't thank you enough for recommending Severus Snape."

Rita inquired, "What sort of work did he do for you, Professor …?"

"Oh, um, I'm Regulus Moonshine, Potions Master, like many of the guests here. I know it will sound unusual to say I took on two students still at Hogwarts during their summer holiday, but I am very pleased. Young Master Black here was kind enough to remember at a previous dinner party that I mentioned some distractions at my home, which is also where I work, and my apprentice is spread thin with all the invaluable help she is, so he kindly recommended a student for possible summer work. A recent orphan who needed some extra money for texts and uniforms, but Master Black was spot on about what a hard worker this young man is. I was hesitant when Mr. Snape wrote back suggesting that another student, the second also doing well in Potions and Herbology, join him. However, I never caught them lolly gagging about. Both were very competent in my lab, my grounds, my greenhouses, and just general work around the house."

"Yes, Mr. Snape certainly is," Rita agreed, warming to reviving her partially written article. "I'm Rita Skeeter, Daily Prophet. I covered that young man receiving an Order of Merlin at Hogwarts for saving other students' lives. It was a brief thing, and he didn't even have time for a photograph before they put him back to work. I believe a lavatory needed repair. Quite economical to use the students to do the repairs around the old place, but I had a feeling that that sort of work was reserved for the less well to do students. Have you ever been asked to repair any part of that crumbling castle, Master Black?"

"No, but uh, Snape's been in detention for a long time. Though I'm sure if he had parents, there would be someone to complain on his behalf. Actually, I think Hogwarts would be in a lot of trouble ..." Regulus hinted. Maybe this evening could turn out less nauseating than he hoped. Why did Slughorn invite a reporter? Was he going to ask his mother to marry him in front of all these people and wanted someone on hand to make sure it was in tomorrow's paper? Sighing to himself, Regulus realized that if anyone was going to save his mother from that, it would have to be him.

"Trouble?" Rita prompted.

"Sometimes the staff goes too far, and fails to consider improprieties. They get caught up with their control over the students. Without it, I know it would be anarchy, but when a staff member crosses the line, either the student has to do as they are told, or face punishment. That's how Mr. Snape ran into trouble. He's a thinker. They don't encourage that. Even the Ministry does not like that sort of thing … I understand they weren't happy with Mr. Snape either for his published essay in The Quibbler. It asked readers to think for themselves."

"So what was he told to do?"

"Well, I'm sure this staff member had Mr. Snape's best interests at heart. Orphaned, coming from a disadvantaged background, he definitely needs a leg up. Without question. He's bright, but without the right connections, or a friend, such as Prof. Moonshine here, he might end up working in the back of a dingy shop the rest of his life."

Moonshine said, "Oh, I'd definitely recommend the fellow. If I didn't have an apprentice already, I'd snatch him up next year, no matter what he got on his NEWTs."

Rita nodded and coaxed, "You are a kind, young man, Master Black, to consider others in such a way."

"Yes, and I'm sure this female staff member saw the opportunity to work out an arrangement with Mr. Snape because she's the very soul of kindness too. However, when she ordered Mr. Snape to remove every stitch of clothing to begin whatever arrangement she had in mind, he refused. Disobeying a staff member cannot be tolerated at Hogwarts. I'm sure whenever Prof. Slughorn instructs a female student to do the same, she obeys instantly. He has a lot of connections, and the girl would have to be a fool to cross him."

"No ..." objected Moonshine, thinking of his sweet apprentice, Tess. Recommended by Horace Slughorn.

"Professor, Hogwarts supports this system of helping disadvantaged students. Why else would a staff member help out a bright student? Hogwarts if full of brilliant, young minds. Didn't you go there? Anyway, it's a fully backed perk of teaching at Hogwarts. Snape has been in detention every night since. Even on Christmas. That's a strong message to send to any student thinking of saying 'no' to any similar request. It's for their own good. The staff only wants to help them, and they can't be expected to do that without receiving something in return."

Horace was in the middle of relating how one of his brightest protégées and faithful correspondents, now living in South Africa, sent him such tales of wonder of what the locals did, when a furor further along the table caught his attention, because Regulus Moonshine was pointing their way, and if he did not know better, the fellow was looking right at him as he addressed someone as, "You cad!"

A blonde woman sitting closer and across from Moonshine, held up her hand and admonished, "Professor, let's not be hasty. It's simply a matter of confirming facts." Looking back towards the head of table, where Horace was sitting, she smiled and said, "You may remember me, Professor Slughorn. I'm Rita Skeeter. Is it true that students are punished for not doing whatever a staff member instructs them to do, even if the student finds it objectionable?"

"You attended school at Hogwarts, Miss Skeeter," Horace answered, remembering she had dull brown hair till fifth year, before she failed to get the requisite OWL to continue on with Potions. "Some students may think they know better than their instructors, but that is very rarely the case. If our instructions are questioned at every turn, nothing would get taught."

"Quite right," Rita agreed. "And outside of class too?"

"Well, yes, we can't have students running wild when classes aren't in session."

Rita stopped herself from suggesting anything about werewolves running wild. That would immediately put her prey on the offensive. "Absolutely. I'm sure you have little trouble with students, Professor. You are known for being an influential friend to many of the brightest and assist with giving them a leg up to help set them on the right career path. Do you ask for anything from them in return?"

"Well … obviously they need to show promise. My patronage is not for sale, if that is what you are implying."

"Oh no. Not bribery, Prof. Slughorn. I meant if there would be some reason why not just any student showing promise would automatically be promoted by you?"

"Not really. I see promise and then once the student has been invited to one of my dinner parties, they know that I know, and uh, maybe they show their gratitude..." Horace saw a number of faces looking his way turn ugly, so he reiterated, "Yes, showing gratitude is all I expect."

"Gratitude is not too much to ask," Rita assured Slughorn, pleased with his choice of words. "I mean after all, who knows where they'd end up without your recommendation? Slaving away in the back of a shop for years, perhaps."

"Exactly."

Walburga interrupted, "Horace does not ask for specific gifts. They willingly send him quidditch tickets, books they've authored, some fine pheasants … nothing extraordinary, but all very nice. Without Horace, as you said, they may not have gotten to where they are today."

"Oh yes," Regulus chimed in, "come Christmas, there's barely room in the professor's office for him to reach his chair. All manner of gifts get sent round like bottles of brandy, wine, firewhiskey, mead and there's all the candy, and then some special items like mother mentioned quidditch, a jersey signed by an entire team. Very lovely things."

"Are there any times that you would discriminate against a student because he or she does not have the means to send you a lovely gift come Christmas?"

"No, absolutely not. It's not just things, Miss Skeeter."

"Services? You're giving them a leg up, and they could give you a hand or something?"

"Exactly."

"Do you ever have a student that does not want your help? The price of gratitude is too high?"

"Never."

"If one did decline, would there be repercussions? Like detention."

"Refusal would be preposterous, but I suppose if the student was disrespectful, a detention would be warranted."

"Disrespectful? I suppose a teenager finding an older witch or wizard repulsive and saying so would actually be insulting. Here you or one of your colleagues are, using a widely accepted manner of trying to assist a poor, yet promising, student, and when he does not have the least bit of sense to cooperate when he should be honored to be singled out for such an arrangement, in which he could express his gratitude to a staff member at Hogwarts taking the time to even give him the least bit of attention … a detention is actually too light a punishment. It's perfectly clear to me now." Turning with a smile to the man seated diagonally from her, she stated, "Prof. Moonshine, please continue."

Regulus was delighted. He held his laughter in well, but there were a few moments during the heated discussion that he feared he was going to pee his pants. When the dust finally cleared, Regulus knew the next part was coming. He had already envisioned it many times as he dreamt of Horace Slughorn being ejected from their house with delight by Kreacher spewing a stream of insults regarding his character and masculinity. Regulus comforted his heartbroken mother.

She had always been too good for that bounder. Mother had been a Black, even before she had married father. Lowly Slughorn had taken advantage of her big-hearted ways. The worst kind of flatterer and parasite, latching onto her at her husband's funeral.

*********************************

Severus got out of the Evans' home for part of the day to go back to Spinner's End, deal with his correspondence and travel to Hogsmeade to use their post office.

He was greeted by the bar man from the Hog's Head who was leading a goat down the road on a ribboned leash, and it also had a frilly bow on its head, matching the one around its neck. Severus admitted his education was incomplete. He had no clue as to the magical significance of goats. Maybe he could slyly inquire about them the next time he took Phi to the Magical Menagerie for a treat. He did not want anyone to laugh at his ignorance. Bad enough he thought the one at Moonshine's was a sheep in front of Lily. She did not sound like it was an honest mistake anyone could make.

Returning to the Evans' for dinner, Severus did not know if the fully set dining table and complete set of courses should be a sign of anything. Knowing Mrs. Evans, the food had already been purchased. Petunia could have assisted with cooking. Lily could too, but it was unlikely with Petunia here. When he left earlier, Petunia had been vacuuming. Although the house looked fine to Severus, he heard her muttering about company coming over and how everything needed to be perfect, before she assigned Lily to wipe down the baseboards.

The expected guests were brought up again during conversation during dinner. Severus understood that these guest were coming to attend the funeral, but it was not going to be at the house. A lot of the details that Petunia and Mrs. Evans were discussing were incomprehensible to him. He did not doubt that they were saddened by Mr. Evans dying, but this was rather business-like. That odd phrase of theirs 'for appearances' crept in now and then, and finally Petunia got to her point that for whatever these appearances were, that she could pack up food for the freak so he didn't starve because he couldn't be seen here for the next week.

To Severus, it was not entirely unexpected. He went to Parkin's, but he was probably invited because he kept her body from being mangled further. He was not the right sort for muggles or wizards. He hadn't even been at his own father's funeral, if one was held, and his mother definitely did not have one. Severus considered that if he was the only one that cared that she was dead, some ceremony with only him would be awkward.

He interrupted the ladies arguing and said, "I have food at my house. Thank you for offering. Should I return on Monday the 22nd?"

"Don't listen to Tunie, Sev."

"I'd rather not make trouble. You should not be arguing over me right now."

Vernon was confused. Severus was a scruffy sort, badly in need of new clothes and a haircut, but if he was here practically every day, he definitely knew Vernon's father-in-law. The man had brought him to his bachelor party, which was a stroke of good luck, and he had borrowed clothes somewhere for their wedding. He suspected that at some point in the past ten years, his Petunia and Severus had some sort of conflict. As long as the fellow remained gentlemanly, he'd stay out of it. His easy concession to his Petunia's plan to stay away was good news.

He had a larger misgiving the next day when he overheard that Severus was supposed to go to Florida with his in-laws. Obviously, the trip was now canceled. Even Petunia's immature, little sister did not argue that.

*********************************

So Slughorn contacted Cuffe to squash her story? Rita Skeeter was not some cow who kept her head down and took whatever crap rained down on her from her 'betters'. With a little reworking and added drama this would be perfect for Witch Weekly. Let Slughorn and Cuffe stuff that up their bums.

The wizards might ignore that publication, however witches were powerful, and may self-important, narrow-minded British wizards giving and receiving legs-up never experience gratitude ever again. Normally, Rita did not care about injustices unless it meant readers, but when a weasel like Cuffe tried to get in her way, it was going to read like Injustice, with a capital 'I'. Even if it was only about candy, booze and quidditch tickets.

*********************************

Another letter from Lily. A letter every morning and twice in the afternoon. If Severus' time had not been freed up to practice Dark Arts, he may have felt some twinge of guilt. Lily said she missed him and needed him.

However, if Severus were to apply what he knew logically, Lily was stubborn. She'd say anything, wouldn't she? Lily was right, and Petunia was wrong, and Severus always took Lily's side against Petunia. That's the way it was supposed to be every time.

The reason being Severus was Lily's friend. Nothing more than a friend. Never would be anything more than best friend that Lily shagged at school. In a few years, Lily would not even admit that. She hardly admitted the shagging part now.

Petunia knew Severus was Lily's freak friend from Spinner's End that was allowed to dirty up their house because he was hungry. Now that Severus was not hungry, he could admit he was lonely as a reason to visit. Lily understood what he said, when she listened, and she honestly made a better companion than Phi.

Severus liked being with Lily, except when she was a complete dunderhead. At those times, he could either laugh at her, or protect her from herself.

There was also Mrs. Evans. She made a valid point that she did not want her daughters arguing. As Severus saw it, Petunia allowed him to attend her wedding so it was now his turn to be the gracious one. Besides, Lily preferred to sit around complaining then, rather than dancing with him. He also recalled Parkin's funeral with Lily's questions, telling him to sit, stand, sit, stand … like he was her puppet. It was without doubt better for his temper to avoid the whole thing.

For the past two days, he had been cleaning out his parents' bedroom. His irrational feelings towards the room were over. If he found himself with an immediate apprenticeship, he may want to sell Spinner's End to muggles quickly. He read that prospective buyers for muggle properties should be able to envision themselves living in the house. Severus supposed the same was true for wizard properties. His parents' bedroom was not 'inviting' so it needed changes.

About noon, Phi flew into the window to let him know his mate and another person were at the front door. He made a face at his familiar. She was not able to comprehend that Lily mindlessly copulating did not mean she was his mate. Lily was quite clear on that.

He hesitated briefly, thinking not to go to the door. Severus did not know what he wanted ultimately with Lily, but he didn't want to leave her standing around in Spinner's End, knocking on the door.

There was no one at the front door when he opened it. He stepped out and looked around in annoyance. He did not delay long in coming down.

Going back inside, he called Phi. Severus doubted she had made a mistake.

When he walked into the kitchen, he saw why Lily was not at the front door. She was peering in the kitchen window. Dursley was with her. Why was she bringing all these different people to his house? The only reason Lily liked it was they were alone to shag. Mr. and Mrs. Evans certainly had not liked his house. He supposed it could be worse. Petunia could be out there with her nose so far in the air, she'd drown if it started to rain again.

Lily saw Severus meander into the kitchen. She had been worried when he didn't answer the front door promptly.

He opened the back door and asked, "What?"

"We have so much food at our house, I thought we'd come over with some for your lunch and later," Lily said, looking closely at Severus. He looked horrible. She doubted he had washed his hair or anything else since she last saw him. His eyes were shadowed with lack of sleep. Severus did not have on a jumper, but at least he did not have on one of his full of holes, greyed and aged undershirts.

"You didn't need to. I have food, Lily," Severus replied, getting out of Lily's way as she entered, without him inviting her in. He gave a nod to Vernon and muttered, "Dursley." If Lily was coming in, he might as well let Dursley enter, rather than leaving him out in the garden.

Dursley moved ponderously so by the time he was in the door, and Severus could close it, Lily was sorting through his food. "Is this all you're eating, Sev?"

"It's fine." Severus did not know why Lily came over here to pick on him. He had enough to eat, and he didn't need to devour half a cow drowned in gravy to feel sated.

"You look horrible."

"I didn't invite you here, Lily, and you are going to wear out your welcome insulting me."

"I'm being serious, Sev. You don't look good. You shouldn't have listened to Petunia … um, sorry, Vernon."

"Hmm," Vernon replied trying to spot anything magical, or freakish as his Petunia called it. The lack of modern appliances reflected poverty or a dislike of modernly prepared food. The stove was antiquated so he leaned towards poorness. Not even an old refrigerator. "You live alone, Snape?"

"Now I do."

"Are you still seventeen?"

"Yes."

"Is this legal? I mean … you aren't eighteen yet." His mother-in-law had been throwing Snape's name into conversation among the family since his Petunia asked he remove himself. His father-in-law naturally came first, but his mother-in-law had a huge heart.

Severus looked confused. Muggles locked up orphans? What kind of dunderheaded law made it illegal to be an orphan prior to the age of eighteen? "They might think my mother is still alive." He turned away and folded his arms over his chest. What if there was such a law? He could do magic to escape capture, and in a couple of weeks would be back at Hogwarts, where muggles could not find him. Unless there was cooperation. A letter, sent to the school, might end up in Slughorn's hands, as his head of house. It may not be just prison till he turned eighteen, but a longer mandatory sentence. Not that it made sense, but some laws were not written to make sense. Muggle or wizard.

"Severus will be going back to school soon. He'll be eighteen next summer," Lily stated.

Lily stating facts was not assuring Severus. She had faith in government and the laws they passed because she thought common sense would stop them from doing acts that were made legal, yet were not necessary. Like casting _crucio_ on the family members of suspects, including children and distant relatives that had not seen the suspect in years, to get any scrap of information. If _crucio_ was cast on him, he'd become agreeable to answering what they wanted to get it to stop.

Their visit left Severus miserable. He did not want food from stranger's houses where he had to save containers so they could back to their rightful owners. Lily argued with occasional murmurs from Vernon. He did not care what he looked like right now. He had been cleaning and had no intentions of going out or receiving visitors today. He did not care what Lily thought about what he ate. Severus ate when he was hungry, and he found nothing wrong with the food he had purchased. By the time Lily started asking questions about the changes in the kitchen, he asked her to leave, and take whatever she brought away with her. It was Lily who said the house had to be arranged for muggles to sell it.

After visiting the muggle library, Severus understood enough that muggle professionals needed to do the electricity bits and even though he understood pipes, the whole system would have to be hooked into the main water supply. Therefore, he was planned that the clothes washing thing would need to get water in and drain out, and it would be convenient to have that below a lavatory upstairs, rather than running pipes all over. He also marked spaces for the refrigerator which needed electricity. If it was against that wall, the wire could also mean a electric socket on the other side for the parlor. Why did Lily feel the need to waltz in and pick at everything, like he was a scabby bit of rubbish?

On top of that, there was this threat of illegal muggle activity by living in this house after his parents died. His solicitor had said the paperwork transferred the title to him so it was Severus' property. Although it was legally his house now, there was some barmy muggle law about being orphaned.

*********************************

Minerva McGonagall arrived back at Hogwarts early. Mr. Snape's letter arrived yesterday. He let her know that Miss Evans' father had died suddenly, and Lily would probably write herself when she felt up to it.

In the meantime, the young man had written that Lily had been enthusiastic over the various projects she wanted to undertake as Head Girl, but may be slow to implement them due to her loss. If it was alright, Severus was willing to do his best to assist getting them started, until Lily was feeling ready to take over.

They also had three pairs of Wigtown Wanderers tickets purchased for upcoming games, and he sent them to Minerva as both a gift for agreeing to be their faculty sponsor, and because he did not want them to go to waste if she or someone she knew could use them.

Since the first game was this afternoon, Minerva thought Albus might like a nice surprise and join her. After unpacking and stowing her carpet bag, Minerva went to the headmaster's office with the two tickets already imagining how delighted Albus would be for an afternoon out with such beautiful weather forecast.

Minerva had not counted on Horace's return. He was in an armchair in Albus' office, with a small table on either side. One stocked with libations, the other with nibbles. Horace was waving something resembling a white tablecloth, and its purpose became clear to Minerva when he blew his nose on it.

"Minerva, you've returned early," Albus commented.

"So has Horace, it appears."

"Well … things didn't work out … but there's still hope that it will get patched up," Albus enthusiastically suggested.

With a dramatic sniff, that was rather disgusting sounding to Minerva, Horace woefully said, "I'll always have you, Albus. You're a rock. A veritable rock. You never have these sorts of trouble. You just give that cocky grin and a wink, everything's sorted, and it's back to the boudoir to make up."

"What …?" Albus sputtered. One of the portraits cackled, but no one was caught awake when Albus looked around. "Horace, old boy, I think you … I'm hear to listen to your heartbreak, and perhaps suggest some remedial ..."

"Drinking and eating?" Minerva suggested.

"Well, there's comfort in that," Albus continued, "but Horace is crushed. He finds the woman for him after all this time, and she turns him out due to mere rumors."

"It was Rita Skeeter," Horace hissed. "Never showed any promise at school. Heart of a barracuda. Still single, you know. Jealous. Simply consumed with constant jealousy of everyone around her."

"If I recall correctly, it was not everyone, but one of your favorites, Bellatrix Black," Minerva reminded him.

"A real shame," Horace lamented. "So much talent, but when one has talent that abundantly, the wrong sort of people take notice."

Minerva's nostrils flared and the corner of her lip curled up. Bellatrix Black an innocent victim? Horace was a total ass. "So, Albus, you are busy this afternoon comforting Horace then?"

"I suppose. Was there something you needed, Minerva?"

"I received a pair of quidditch tickets from Mr. Snape for this afternoon. Soothing a distraught Horace is more important. I'll nip down to the greenhouses and see if Pomona's about, or perhaps Rubeus or Argus. Whoever I meet up with first."

"Snape?" repeated Horace in disbelief, then nastily added, "You might as well take Argus than. He's so happy he found another squib to hang around with."

"Horace ..." exclaimed Albus.

"Calling Hogwarts' Head Boy a squib now? Really, Horace. Besides I received these tickets through a sad turn of events. Miss Evans' father passed, and they were already purchased. Quite forthcoming that he'd rather not see them go to waste if I knew someone that could use them."

Minerva enjoyed the look of shock on Horace's face before saying, "I guess I'll see you two later then. Buck up, Horace, there's plenty of other rich widows in the sea."

"Very well, Minerva. I would have loved to come with you, but as you can see, Horace is very sensitive to rejection."

Horace was still speechless as Minerva exited, but then was able to catch enough breath to gasp questioningly, "She was joking?"

"A jest about a student's parent's death …?" Albus saw Horace shake his head negatively so tried, "About quidditch tickets?" After another shake, he asked, "Than what?"

"Snape … Head Boy?"

"Surely you knew that Horace. That was decided months ago. That really was unkind of you to call Mr. Snape a squib. I really have to take objection to that," Albus stated, his tone growing steely. His sister used to be called a squib. When used as an insult, it was a terrible thing to say.

"Surely he bewitched the lot of you in some way. I mean come now … Head Boy? Severus Snape? He's nothing."

"See here, Horace. I don't know in what way you think Mr. Snape has slighted you, but it stops here. I heard from Atlas that a second discovery will be accredited to Mr. Snape in The Practical Potioneer, and I only received this morning a glowing letter of thanks from another Potions Master who employed Mr. Snape and Miss Evans over the summer."

"Absolute poppycock. The scoundrel looked up the name of a British Potions Master and forged a letter. And Atlas, well … he may know his subject, but he knows absolutely nothing about Potions."

Albus pursed his lips, let out a slow breath and intoned, "I think you should leave my office, Horace. I am not feeling kindly towards you at the moment."

Although previously inconceivable, was Horace one of the enemies identified by Augury?

*********************************

By evening, Severus had gotten so worked up that he wrote an angry letter to Lily. He'd stuff it up her owl's arse the next morning, or that's what he had planned the whole time he was writing it.

Now that it was folded over and he had scribbled just 'Lily' on it, this was not a good time to be sending her letters accusing her of being a bossy know-it-all that he was tired of having toy around with him. Mr. Evans was not even dead a week yet. When she came over to Spinner's End, Lily might have been looking to disregard that by being a … total jerk towards him.

What the hell was that? Severus thought as he gave the radio a glance. The music was odd. Some muggle music on this station was indecipherable, but he understood the lilting lyrics to this, or at least what the words were. Was it some sort of code? It sounded like every verb was replaced by the word 'jamming'. Severus supposed the music was nice, in its own way, but the lyrics made no sense at all. Perhaps it was religious was what he concluded after he heard 'We're jamming in the name of the Lord'. That sounded like what they were saying at Lily's church.

The radio then earned a dark glare as the song concluded and the man started talking about the weather, without saying what that just was. How did that muggle know to only say who or what a song was when Severus did not care?

Severus started muttering to himself about asinine muggles who only wanted to let listeners know when the Beatles played. They were in freaking Britain. Everyone knew those songs. Even his father recognized them. Pain in the ass muggles, is what he was complaining about as he cast _incendio_ on the letter to Lily.

*********************************

After spending the afternoon fuming over Severus asking her to leave, when all she was there to do was make sure he was alright and obviously he wasn't, Lily was not amenable to Petunia innocently inquiring Vernon about their visit to Spinner's End over dinner. If Tunie wanted her husband to tell her something, it didn't have to be in front of mum.

Vernon answered slowly, because he knew his wife did not like her sister's friend. "Uh … well, I think your mother may be right on a few things. He is seventeen and alone over there. You did say it was a rough neighborhood that way, though being daylight, it seemed passable."

"Full of drug addicts," Petunia informed him. "Filthy, was it?"

"It's next to the river so the odor was not good. His house was tidier outside than others, no real garden growing, but his kitchen was simple and clean."

"Clean?" Petunia repeated.

"Yes, not sanitary like here or at home, since he does not have anything new, but the walls were a solid white. That's what gave the illusion of clean, I suppose."

"White?" Mrs. Evans asked. "They were yellow last time. I told him the color would not age well. Did he say that's why he changed it?"

"No, we did not discuss that, " Vernon said. Maybe that was the magical thing. Snape could change the color of his walls at whim.

"Mum, leave Sev alone about that," Lily interjected. "He's a boy. He shouldn't care about what color things are."

"Lily, you said he may be interested in selling that house. White may look better."

"He's not going to be able to sell it for anything without electricity or water."

"He doesn't have electricity or running water?" Vernon asked. "Is that even allowed?"

"No one cares what goes on down that way, as long as it stays there," Petunia stated.

"Petunia, that's not true. Those are older houses that were put up in a rush when the factories first opened because the demand for housing was so high. I doubt they gave little thought to the future of those buildings," Mrs. Evans explained, "or even about all the changes that were about to come to make homes more comfortable and convenient."

"What does he do for money?" Vernon asked, "Other than that summer job you two had."

"I don't know," Lily said. "He got a bit from his father having life insurance at work."

"Oh," Mrs. Evans gasped. "Did Severus say how much he put into the trip? I canceled the hotel reservation, but he paid my husband cash towards that."

In disbelief Petunia gasped, "He paid?"

"Yes," snipped Lily, "and got a passport, and oh … the portkeys too. They're up in my closet. I don't think those are returnable for a refund."

"He could still go on his own if he wanted to," Petunia commented.

"Why would he?" Lily asked. "I picked the place."

"That's no surprise."

"Girls ..."

"What?" Petunia replied, "I'm just saying, I am not surprised."

Lily rolled her eyes, then defended Severus, "Sev picked a nice place too. He wanted to go to Greece. It's just that I wanted to have fun, and Severus would prefer to look at antiquities."

A gleam entered Petunia's eye as she asked, "Does he even know what Walt Disney World is?"

*********************************

Rita was torn. Her article was to appear in the 'Back to School' issue of Witch Weekly, but not as the cover story. However, this issue sold very well on the news stand every year so it could be seen by more than just the idle witches subscribing to get fresh paper for the bottoms of their owl cages.

Bartemius Crouch Sr. did not read Witch Weekly, but Mrs. Crouch did. He thought she was merely going to complain about him staying late at the office and missing dinner, however that was not the case this evening, and she called in Junior to confirm some of the facts in the article. The only thing that was reassuring was Junior doubted any member of the Hogwarts staff would offer to make an arrangement with him because his father had more influence than all of them put together.

Walburga Black was scandalized, but at least her boys were Blacks, and no old witch would dare to take advantage of her handsome sons. She should have realized it sooner. Slughorn had taught at Hogwarts when she was a student there. Dumbledore too. They had their favorites and in hindsight, it should have been obvious. At the time, she was only an innocent school girl. What had she known about this sort of thing? Her husband, Orion, had been the only wizard that she had known in the marital sense, until this gigolo had seduced her by using her widowly grief against her. Regulus was absolutely right. No Black should allow someone to treat her that way.

Mrs. Cresswell questioned her son, Dirk, incessantly before writing a letter to Filius Flitwick regarding Horace Slughorn and his blatant favoritism of her son, and how he insisted that Dirk stay there over the Christmas holidays for 'extra tutoring'.

Poppy Pomfrey clutched her chest when she got around to reading her subscription copy of Witch Weekly, which had followed her on holiday to Venice. She was not named in the article and it vaguely referred to arrangements and gratitude in exchange for a leg up, which was not something she had ever offered to Severus Snape, but from these quotes from Horace, one could think faculty were offering students favors in exchange for illicit activities.

Pomona Sprout and Minerva McGonagall shared an issue and discussed it, before consulting with Argus. This may be why he was so easy on Mr. Snape. Argus was appalled by what he read, but he did recall that woman snooping around the school months ago to get this photo of Snape grouting tile. This Skeeter woman had been here on the headmaster's invitation. As far as Argus was concerned, there were punishments and than there were punishments. A good beating never hurt anyone. This was disgusting so he ambled along after the two ladies to clarify his part in this sordid affair.

Horace Slughorn did not subscribe nor read Witch Weekly. It was a magazine for witches, despite Albus nattering on about recipes and knitting. He should have suspected something was up when Albus flooed him and summoned him to his office. Yes, summoned, instead of kindly inviting him. The reason was obvious as he stepped out of the grate. Minerva and Pomona. Two witches who should mind their own business. And what was Filch doing up here? Come to complain about the dungeon ceiling again? Really, the whole lot of them were jealous of him. In a little while, he'd patch things up with Walburga, and he wouldn't look back.

Albus said he was quoted in the magazine. Horace protested that he never read the tattle sheets, but Albus insisted he look at it, handing it to him, while jabbing his finger at the particular quote.

"So? I may have said something similar to this."

"It's not taken out of context?" Albus hinted.

"What?" Horace asked, and then looked above and below where he was mentioned. "I … I guess other staff members could have their favorite students, but none have my connections," he said, broadly hinting that Minerva and Pomona were out of their league.

Seeing their reaction to his statement, he flipped back a page to see a photo of Snape dressed shabbily and doing something for Filch. What did that have to do with anything? Rita Skeeter wrote this. What did she write that involved Snape and him? Other than Slytherin house, which one quarter of British, Welsh, Scottish and Irish wizards and witches had in common, there was nothing.

The article was the idiotic fluff that was usually in this publication. Some teachers saw promise in students, and recognizing it may have attempted to duplicate Horace's methods. No one could, of course. Snape had never been one of his. One of these two thought to get a little something on the side and botched it badly. How was that his fault? Back when Horace was Snape's age, though he was much better looking, if some old witch tried to suggest such a thing, he'd have to consider that perhaps he would prefer Filch. Minerva was probably a tough, old bird in bed too.

Taking a stab at what this meeting was about, Horace suggested, "So, we going to claim Snape lied to save one of your asses? I supposed I'd take any of you over that talentless shit so you got my support. No one would believe anyone could help him out after school, unless you found he was talented in some other way … you know what I mean? Apprentice him until he got too old for it?"

Argus suggested, "I think I could jury rig one of the old thumbscrews for use elsewhere." The mud splattering, giggling youth grew up to be filthier wizards. If they had been punished proper like when they was younger, there'd be no He Who Must Not Be Named, Death Eaters, corrupt Ministry officials and polluter of youth that besmirched his hallways.

*********************************

Lily's twice daily letters to Severus only received a couple of replies. Short replies that said nothing. He'd answer her questions in as little words as possible.

Petunia and Vernon left Sunday morning so Vernon could go to work on Monday. Her note to Severus suggesting he should come over for dinner Saturday to say good-bye to the Dursleys received an odd reply. One word 'really?' was surrounded by curlicue doodles that spread out to fill the entire parchment. Since when did Sev idly doodle? He did not show up for Saturday dinner, or any time on Sunday.

Lily had been angry at him, but her temper cooled. There may actually be a reason for him to act this way. He looked unwell at Spinner's End. She doubted he had taken up drinking, but Lily had not left the kitchen to investigate further. He had not smelled of liquor. Did her father dying remind him of his parents? It was not as clearcut as Lily did not go to his father's funeral, if there was one, so he would not go to Mr. Evans'.

She knew her mum was trying to put on a brave face through all this, and Petunia was a double-sided coin. Both wanting to take over to give mum less to worry about, and wanting to take over so it was done the way Petunia wanted it done. As long as things were getting done Tunie's way, her sister was pleased and things were flowed smoothly. Her only concession on Severus was to allow Vernon to escort Lily to his house to make sure he was eating. Probably because mum kept mentioning it as more food kept showing up at their house. To Lily, Petunia's assessment was harsh. Severus was her chum from school, not a family member. It was unfortunate that he had no other friends, parents, clothes, food, money, hobbies or other pursuits, but he could not be underfoot, hanging around their house now. He had no right to be angry since a derelict, such as him, should be happy for any notice at all.

Lily was furious, and could not figure out how Petunia could get all that out in rapid hisses just before mum reentered the room. Lily was glad Tunie went home. A week of her sister was too much for Lily anymore. Vernon was welcome to her.

Although Lily thought she got up early on Monday, Severus was already in the kitchen with mum when she got downstairs. Mum's eyes were red-rimmed again, rather than the constant pink and puffy look they constantly had in the past week. She glared at Severus, but he looked puzzled, rather than sitting there with that gloating look he had whenever he embarrassed the Marauders. Not that Severus had ever picked on her mother, but sometimes Lily lapsed to believing all those lies about Sev and the Dark Arts, and fancied Severus the enemy of Gryffindors everywhere, lifting an eyebrow cockily, getting caught with that slight smirk and then folding his arms over his chest as he surveyed the Marauders' predicament. Not really Dark Arts to have their toe nails grow uncontrollably, was it? Those toerags asked for it anyway.

"Morning," she said to see if something became apparent.

"Lily," Severus replied.

"Good morning, dear. Let me get your tea."

Severus had a teacup and a bowl. His hair had been washed in the past day or two. Lily thought he still looked unhealthy. What had he been up to over there, besides changing the color of the walls?

"How have you been, Severus?" Lily asked.

With another confused look, Severus glanced at Lily. It was a typical question that was politely asked, but normally Lily did not speak to him that way. Other than her mother still being emotional, what else was going on? "Fine," he replied, then added the standard return question, "And the two of you?"

Lily's brow furrowed. Why was Severus speaking like that? "Uh … well, holding up."

"I already told Severus he could have come back sooner, Lily. I wasn't thinking clearly and let Petunia suggest things that weren't friendly … though Severus was an absolute gentleman about it."

Several biting remarks passed through Severus' mind. He let them go. In a week and a half, he'd be back at Hogwarts, and there would be the distance both from here and time to reflect. He did not want Mrs. Evans to start crying again. There were very few people that Severus would enjoy making cry, and neither Lily nor her mother were on that list. Well, Lily was not on it most of the time, and he probably would not find it enjoyable if he did make her cry. Perhaps some sort of reciprocal satisfaction for the way she treated him, but it would not make him happy.

"I said something," Lily protested.

"There were higher priorities," Severus suggested. "I was not offended."

"I was," Lily replied. "You are here all the time, Sev."

"It's alright."

Lily frowned at him. Maybe he was being polite for her mum's sake. She did not want her mother upset any more than was necessary, so she'd wait until later to talk to Severus about the past week. In a way her anger at Petunia and Severus took her mind off her father. She realized it was self-centered, but it was how she felt.

The paper and mail arrived while Lily was eating while sneaking glances at Severus at the counter to see if he made some sign while mum wasn't watching. He didn't have to sit over there anymore. It wouldn't be disrespectful for him to take Petunia's chair.

Only the newspaper was for Lily. The two other owls had mail for Severus. He muttered in disgust, "Why are people writing me? I already went to the Post Office yesterday."

After a year of correspondence, Severus recognized Longbottom's squared off penmanship, indicative of what a blockhead he was. He suspected that the auror-in-training spent his Sundays composing his weekly letter, than charmed enough copies for all his correspondents to provide their Frank and Alice update.

He opened the other letter first.

"What's wrong, Sev?"

"It's that Gumboil fellow from Law Enforcement. He wants me to come to the Ministry this week to answer questions."

"Did you do anything last week?"

"No, I was home most of the time. I would guess if I was in trouble, he'd come to me, rather than inviting me to visit him."

"Maybe it's Potter."

"He should concentrate on quidditch. Cannons still at the bottom of the league?"

Lily turned to the back of the paper and looked. "Yeah, even with Perfect Potter, able to play all seven positions at once, they still are."

"He's saving himself for England. World Cup's next summer."

Lily laughed. Potter did claim that he'd be busy after graduation because he'd be leading England to the World Cup in '78. He promised to send her a ticket. "How does the World Cup work?"

"What do you mean?"

"I know it's every four years like the Olympics, and each team represents a country."

"I don't know much more than that, but I think back in '74, it was held prior to the professional quidditch season starting so the regular players did not miss their games or something like that."

"There's a quidditch season?"

Severus nodded, "They aren't playing all year long. There's an off-period where they are recruiting, trading and training so there's still a reason to talk about it."

"Yeah, 'cause it's always in the paper and the boys never shut up about it."

Severus shrugged. He knew enough about the Wanderers to get him through a conversation, but he had no plans to discuss them daily unless someone else brought up the subject, and there was something new to discuss since the last time he conversed with that individual. Some dunderheads lacked originality and repeated the same thing every time they talked about quidditch.

"Are you going today?"

"I guess I could. Did you need anything while I was in London?"

"Can't I come with you?"

"It might take a while," Severus replied with a pointed look at Mrs. Evans. She'd be alone soon enough when Lily went back to school, and he did not need Lily to hold his hand. If it was a situation where he needed to lie, though he did not foresee it, Lily was not a good liar. She was more of an indignant demander.

"Can it wait till this afternoon at least? I haven't talked to you in over a week."

"Alright."

"So what have you been up to? You said you stayed home."

"I'm working on a new arithmancy project. I also cleaned out my parents' bedroom and the upstairs hall, making room for a small upstairs lavatory."

"Uh ..." Lily stalled. Mr. Filch showed Severus a lot during detention. " … I guess big enough for a tub too?"

"Nothing lavish like school."

With a little smirk, Lily commented, "I don't know. Indoor plumbing is so twentieth century."

"What about heat, Severus? You should not have plumbing without the indoor temperature being maintained so the pipes do not freeze," Mrs. Evans advised.

"Oh … good idea. I haven't thought about that. I know the muggles were going to have to do the work because I don't understand the electricity part, nor can I connect the house to the water supply without someone noticing."

"All of that is a big investment. Perhaps you should wait till you are back at the house to make sure it's working properly?"

"Working properly?"

"Well … there's always stories. No one that I know around here. Besides, paying to heat the house while you aren't living there … it might be better to wait till next summer."

Perhaps Mrs. Evans was correct. Thinking that he would immediately receive an apprenticeship after graduation was absurd. NEWT grades might take a month or more, like OWLs. Then thinking that someone would want him with reasonable terms for an apprenticeship was that ridiculous hopefulness that made him so miserable. Hope was for fools, and Severus did not want to remain a wretched fool.

Mrs. Evans knew that a furnace was expensive, along with an electrician and a plumber. The necessary improvements would make the house in Spinner's End salable, but how could he afford the expense prior to a sale? Mr. Snape may have had life insurance, but even if it was equal to her husband's, which she highly doubted, Severus should still be careful with that money.

Suddenly, Mrs. Evans asked, "Severus, how much do I owe you for the trip that got canceled? I don't know how much you gave my husband for the hotel. The reservation was canceled in time so there was no penalty."

Severus shrugged and replied, "It's not important, Mrs. Evans. I've probably eaten more than that in food here."

"You don't need to pay me for food, Severus."

"I'm not worried about it."

"But Sev ..." Lily protested.

"Stop bothering me about it."

It was one thing for a fellow to be a gentleman about money, but Lily felt Severus could not afford to lose money like this. It was not his fault they had not gone.

Severus repeated he was not interested in being paid back when Lily got him alone to sit on the front porch, and then added, "Leave it alone, Lily. Stop bothering me about money. I have enough. You have some now too. It should not be foremost in your thoughts."

"Foremost?" Lily repeated. "It's not. I'm just saying that I don't want you to think we're taking advantage of you because dad died."

"That's mad. I don't think that."

"What do you think?"

"Huh?"

"I'm worried about you, Sev."

"Me? What do you mean?"

"You spent a whole week alone."

"I'm alright alone."

"Without me."

"You wrote ..." Severus said, not willing to repeat the things Lily wrote to him. He read it, but he doubted she needed him.

"You look ill. Even though you had some food … I mean come on, what did you have? Cabbage? Plums?"

"There was more than that. I ate whenever I was hungry."

"You need someone to keep an eye on you, Sev."

Severus made a face. Lily was being melodramatic. He could go along with it for a while, as long as it was not too extreme. Mr. Evans dying was unexpected. Maybe she felt guilty for taking her father for granted? Severus was not sure if he even missed his. He did miss his mother. She did not keep an eye on him though. He'd prefer Lily kept tabs on Mrs. Evans, rather than him.

"Don't you want to be together more?" she asked. "I thought we had a lovely time, even if we were working at Mould-on-the-Wold."

"Not everyone is as lenient as Moonshine."

"Why shouldn't he? We did an excellent job for him."

"He knew we were both seventeen. To him that meant something different than it does to others. I think for the remainder of the holiday, we should not upset your mother by disobeying the rules your parents already set down."

"I … no, I didn't mean that. I don't want to get caught again by my mother, or to upset her. I'm just so … I don't know … angry. I don't like the way Petunia just took over like that, and demanded you leave."

"I'd rather choose when I stand up to your sister. Your mother was upset when the two of you argued, so I took the easy way out."

"But why? You stand up to people all the time, Sev."

"Hardly all the time. I wouldn't have time for anything else, if I did."

"You know what I mean … why'd you give in that easily?"

"Petunia would not have shut up. You'd complain either way, but at least if one of you was satisfied, your mother would not have her hands full of the two of you. There was also all the crying. I don't like seeing that."

"It's not like you never cry, Sev."

"I try not to. Besides, in case you haven't noticed, Vernon's bigger than me. If it came down to it, I'm sure being newly married, he might think to solve the problem by suggesting I stay home."

"You could jinx him."

"Jinxing muggles? Is my name Potter?"

"Oh … well, if he hit you …"

"If he hit me hard enough, it would be a while before I cast anything."

"I'd jinx him then."

"I don't think that would be appropriate. You've told me for years your family comes first, Lily. I understand, and last week that took priority."

"I think of you as close as family now, Sev. I mean, you are here whenever I'm home."

"I can come over every day now that Petunia and Vernon have gone home."

"So you aren't angry like me?"

"No."

"Are you still unhappy?"

"About what?"

"When you said you were unhappy."

"I'm not happy right now. I don't think I should be."

"Is there something I could do?"

"You? Um, I don't have any expectations of anything right now from you, Lily. I prefer to listen to you because things in your life have changed. It would be unreasonable for me to expect you to … whatever you had in mind? Entertain me? What do you mean?"

"I'm not sure, Sev. You are a mystery still."

"I'm not such a mystery if you took time to think, Lily. I do feel your insults."

"What insults?"

"Any of them. You can disagree with me, but I'd prefer something constructive."

"Like what insult? You mean when you thought the goat was a sheep?"

"I don't remember you insulting me then."

"Well, maybe I don't like … oh, it's alright when you kid me because you only pick on little stuff like those stupid butterfly wings. And you haven't brought that up in months now."

"I don't need to. You constantly reminisce about the experience."

"I do not."

Severus smirked. Who brought up sugared butterfly wings today?

"You won't be smiling like that later, will you?"

"At the Ministry? Hell no."

"What do you think he wants?"

"I have no idea. I haven't been doing anything. The portkeys were legally reserved and purchased through the Ministry. I think that office also investigates illegal portkeys so it would not be Gumboil."

"Maybe Potter said we were extorting that money for Mary?"

"They wrote us first."

"Can you come back later to tell me so I don't have to wait till tomorrow morning?"

"I guess I can, if I'm free to leave."

"Did you get any other interesting letters?"

"You don't find Lovegood interesting."

Lily rolled her eyes.

"Did you write McGonagall?" Severus asked. "I wrote her a brief letter last week. I was worried that she would be disappointed in you losing interest in all your Head Girl projects, without knowing why."

"What?"

"If you are not feeling like tackling everything as soon as we set foot on Platform 9 ¾, I can do some things until you are in the spirit of whatever you had planned."

"Oh. I guess you're right. I haven't given any of that thought over the past week."

"Even with me supposedly being Head Boy, I don't think I could bring the same enthusiasm to your projects."

"You thought some of them up."

"Did I? I suggested we dress up and have a party to promote school spirit?"

"No, but you thought up the Wigtown Wanderers club."

"You are bringing the passion to that endeavor."

"I guess."

"So that's why I wrote her. I didn't want her to think you were flighty over Parkin."

"Oh … I guess that would look bad. Did we have any games this week?"

"Uh, I sent her our tickets too. I can purchase more if you really want to go."

"Our tickets?"

"I didn't think you'd want to go see quidditch right now, and they were already bought."

"I suppose you are right. I was only asking because I knew they were already paid for," Lily responded. She did not feel like going to a game. It was an irrational concern that they would go to waste if they did not go. Why would Severus give them to Prof. McGonagall? She suddenly laughed aloud at the thought that Sev could have invited Mr. Filch to go with him, if he wanted a staff member from school. With Mrs. Norris and Phi.

"What?"

"Nothing. I'm just thinking silly things."

Severus hoped it was about the look on Potter's face and the fine pureblooded temper tantrum he was going to have.

"Oh, have you given any more thought to our fancy dress, Sev?"

"Me? I thought you were going to choose."

"But you are really good about all that history stuff."

"There were not a lot of British female heroic warrior types running about that got their names and descriptions noted. Did you want to be Guinevere?"

"The queen who cheated on King Arthur?"

"I don't think she could help it. There was something about the first time she saw Lancelot or something like that."

"In any case, no, I don't want to dress as her."

Severus was silent while Lily thought. He didn't imagine himself as Arthur or Lancelot, but it was the goal of this to disguise himself as something he wasn't?

"Since you aren't going to be my damsel in distress, are there any adversaries you'd like to be, Sev? Maybe we can find my costume that way."

"Merlin had a couple enemies, but I think they were female."

"If I go as a male, you could be female."

Hesitantly, Severus said, "That would be unexpected. Is winning whatever prize worth it? I'd rather not be degraded. What about the three Fates with MacDonald?"

"I don't want to do anything with Mary. Just you. And they're old ladies. I want to be a hero, Sev."

"Hercules? Then I could be Zeus."

"Will we have to explain who they are? I don't want to wear a tag that reads 'Hercules'."

"If you want a potion to give you atlas strength, we can brew that. You can then perform feats of strength."

"What about you?"

"I don't think I should hurl thunderbolts in the Great Hall."

"Was Zeus the enemy of Hercules?"

"He was his father, and Hercules' opponent was Eurystheus, nominated by Hera to be a hero. It was a sort of contest for Zeus and Hera to each nominate a mortal."

"Wasn't Hera married to Zeus? Why would she choose someone over her son?"

"Hercules wasn't her son. Zeus had bastards all over the place. As many as a pureblood with a taste for muggles."

"What?"

"Zeus liked mortals. He assumed a whole bunch of forms to seduce them."

"No, the pureblood thing."

"They trick muggles into having sex with them and then take off. Some of the supposed muggleborn are really half-bloods. That's why they stopped doing any sort of family line magic as part of the curriculum at Hogwarts. Too many muggleborns were found to be very closely related to their fellow students."

"Where'd you hear that?"

"Lovegood. He knows a lot of historical magic and its uses."

Lily made a face. That crackpot Lovegood was still writing Severus? "Do you have any other source besides Lovegood?"

"Slytherins. Perhaps blokes in other houses talk about it. Maybe because I live in a muggle town, I don't see the appeal of hitting some beautiful girl with a bunch of spells and using her."

"Use them?"

"It would be simple. See one, hit her with _confundus_ or _stupefy_, act like you're helping her, get her alone, and do it. What would she remember? There's also being especially charming in a club or somewhere, but that wouldn't work for me."

"Who'd want to do something like that?"

"Don't muggles take advantage of women that are drunk?"

"There are students that talk about that?"

"Yes. There were pictures that Dumbledore confiscated."

"How can you tell from a photo if it's a witch or muggle?"

"If she's going to end up dead, probably no difference, but if she'll live, usually the brutal ones are with muggles. Witches could always show up at the Ministry later."

"Dead?"

"If it's a muggle, some wouldn't care. Don't they attack muggles for fun already? Not much difference from the fun at school with tormenting the girls with their blouses and skirts, or attacking the lads when they're alone in the loo."

"They're all toerags. Now that you're Head Boy, can't you catch them, like you did with Dumbledore?"

"Dumbledore was following us. So I knew eventually he'd be behind us in a corridor. I also had to be careful in case it was not Peeves."

"Careful?"

"If it was a person, I should not dismember or decapitate them."

Lily made a face. Rules and laws only worked when everyone obeyed them, rather than only worrying about getting caught and not being able to buy their way out of it. Secretly she was glad that Sev's father and mates killed three of their attackers. They never would have gone to Azkaban. More purebloods like Potter and Black. Even if they put a Dark Mark over the pub, proving they were Death Eaters.

Severus watched while Lily thought. If the school really cared about the bullying, they'd do something. Perhaps now, it was not prudent to encourage the bullies, especially Gryffindors, as Dumbledore had in the past, but someone still had to mess up royally to get truly punished. It was nothing new. If Potter and Black had not killed another student, they boasted how they planned on becoming aurors. Authorized to bully and cast Unforgivables on whoever they didn't like the looks of, just like whenever they went in the gents' at Hogwarts and started jinxing and hexing.

Lily murmured, "Sev," and took his hand. Her eyes dropped from his dark ones because he was looking intense. She liked when he said what was on his mind, but sometimes Severus surprised her with the directions of his thoughts.

"Why's your hand still dark? Are these bruises or something else?"

"My hand's fine."

"No, the color's bad. Even if you don't like eating meat, it has stuff your body needs."

Severus' 'color' was always bad. People came in different colors. Why couldn't this be his? Besides the fact that he fused a dark-colored wand into his left hand. Admittedly, that was only healthy when someone disarmed his everyday wand and he used this to save his life.

"Sev?"

"What?"

"You're not saying anything."

Severus did not know what Lily wanted him to say. He felt she should spend more time looking at healer techniques, if she was going to start an apprenticeship in a year. Lily was good at charms so it wasn't that she was not capable, just that she might not have the attitude. She wanted to be a hero and save lives. Healers could do that, but not everyday. With a sigh, he replied, "You always say my color is bad. With everything else that's wrong about my appearance, I doubt it matters."

Lily knew exactly what Severus was saying. His hair was clean now, but everything else like how it was long and just hung there, his nose, the pockmarks that did not appear on track to clear up in one year, and his lack of physique and unhealthy look. "I did not mean it as an insult. I know that I have pinkish pale skin, but yours when we have our arms side by side, has like a yellow to it. Not olive or brown like I've seen with others. Mum thinks there may be something wrong with your liver."

"The whites of my eyes would turn yellow too, if it was my liver. My mother had the same coloring. I think it's inherited."

Her mouth quirked as she held in her response regarding alcohol poisoning. Lily had seen Severus consume some ale, but that was in the past year or so. Before that, she had never observed her friend drink. If he was an alcoholic like his parents, would he drink any sort of booze? Sev had declined mead, and did not drink much champagne at either of the weddings they had attended, and there had been glasses appearing everywhere at the Longbottoms'. "I realize that, Sev, but maybe she was sick with something that you now have too."

"If you are still talking to me in a couple years, you can practice your healer charms on me."

"If I'm still talking to you?"

"You might meet someone. Isn't that your plan?"

"Well, he'd have to be a … I don't know, someone extraordinary to get me to even think of him in that way, and that doesn't mean you still won't be my best friend. What kind of jerk would make me give up my friends to date him? Besides, I'm kind of fond of you. We're good together at school and our brief taste of work, and uh … brilliant otherwise so maybe I shouldn't want things to change."

"Are you saying anything decisive?"

"What?"

"Am I to come to any understanding based on 'kind of fond' and maybe we should still shag in secret?"

"That's not what I said."

"Can you restate it without indefinite terms like 'maybe' and 'probably'? What do you want?"

"Why are you putting me on the spot like this, Sev?"

"You brought it up. We were talking about my health, your plan to apprentice to become a Healer, and you may meet some wizard who is destined to fulfill everything you need from a husband. You've made it clear numerous times, that I am not that person. Therefore, my plans should not revolve around you."

"What plans?"

"Mine or yours?"

"Yours, Sev."

"What? Mine aren't different. I may have to find an apprenticeship in another country. Maybe as close as Ireland. But it's doubtful to be around here or London. I'm also going to be particular about the terms so that might eliminate most potential Potions Masters from taking me on."

"You've told me that before, but why won't you plan for me?"

"Plan for you? Why would you listen to me, Lily?"

"I listen to you."

"I mean listen and consider what I say."

"Like what?"

"When I've asked you about leaving England, or even Scotland, I suppose, you are against it. Though things have changed. I know you'd want to stay close enough to your mother now that you can get home easily. However, should that mean I should make an effort to stay close to you?"

"Why not? I mean you know me. You don't warm up to other people easily, Sev. Besides, what about you know?"

Severus glanced around for Mrs. Evans. He saw her silhouette through the house. She was still in the kitchen. "If you mean shagging, that's brief, Lily. You don't want to marry me. You don't even want other people to know you are that close to me. And if you are considering still having sex with me after you marry whoever, then you should not marry someone else."

"I didn't say that."

"Well, how am I supposed to know what you mean?"

"If he was that bad at it, I wouldn't marry him."

His eyebrow quirked as he irreverently asked, "You are going to shag your way through single wizards and widowers all over Great Britain to determine that I am naturally brilliant?"

Lily returned a look of disgust and amusement, "Well, I wouldn't go that far. I'd probably concede after a couple disappointments that I am very lucky to have found you."

"You going to get to work on that soon?"

"What?"

"Well, I don't want to be twiddling my thumbs for years for you to come to the obvious conclusion. So the sooner you can get cracking on this new plan of yours to eliminate the other possibilities would be appreciated."

"You want me to shag other guys?"

"No."

"Then why are you suggesting it?"

"If your condition for saying 'yes' or 'no' to me involves you riding on a couple hundred, or maybe a thousand cocks, I suggest you get to it. I'm not getting any younger, and I got to get on with things, one way or the other."

"That's sick, Sev."

"You suggested it. Just say 'no', and I'll leave you alone."

"Why would you want me to say 'no'?"

"My life is miserable. I don't have much hope, and I feel for a year, I've wasted it on you because you have no intention of doing more than using me for a daily shag."

"You're being unreasonable. We had a lovely summer, till recently, and what Petunia did was wrong. You shouldn't let her push you away like that. I was arguing for you to stay, but you just gave in."

"I've already explained that. Lily, you aren't understanding. Dursley could stay because he's married to your family. I am not married, or engaged, or anything. I'm nothing. I can be nothing anywhere. I don't need to be nothing orbiting you to reaffirm I'll never be anything more."

"You're not nothing. Sev, you spent the last week alone, and you're angry. You have a lot going on. You're Head Boy. The Potions Master you did work for's happy. You got me to listen to you, and talk to. And after you talk to Gumboil, you come back here, and tell me all about it, and if you don't want to eat meat, mum'll still make something for you. Doesn't she always?"

Food and sex. Lily was a simpleton. If someone had those two things, they had to be happy. "You're annoying me," Severus baldly stated. "I might as well go now. Has your mother gotten to the store, or did Dursley stock you two up before he left?"

"What?"

"If I'm coming back, I can pick up whatever, if your mother does not want to go out."

"Um … I think Tunie took care of that. You might want to check with her. We're going through a lot of milk with all the tea we're drinking."

"Alright," he said as he stood.

"You're just going?"

"I'm going to change my clothes, then go."

"No, I meant, you're leaving during an argument?"

"An argument? I thought you were simply stating yet another condition that needed to be fulfilled. I concur that your mother does go out of her way to make sure I am fed, when I am here."

"Why are you so odd, Sev?"

"What? I listen to you, interpret what I hear, and then repeat it back to you to make sure I am understanding."

"And you get it all wrong."

"Like how? You are not marrying me because you anticipate meeting better wizards when you leave school. This better wizard needs to be equal or superior to me with shagging, in order for you to consider marrying him because I have stated that I do not want to continue shagging you once you are married to someone else. You said you understand my stand on that, Lily. Therefore, you are willing to test out as many of these wizards that you perceive superficially superior to me in a carnal way. I asked that you limit the time period of this testing phase, and that perhaps it should start soon, since I am unsure of my plans and would like to know definitively whether to include you or not. I realize it has been most likely not as you elaborate on your plans, since they do not make an allowance for me. However, I would rather have a firm answer from you regarding your intentions before I go my separate way."

"Giving me an ultimatum is not very nice, Sev."

"If you choose to take it as an ultimatum, then consider it so. Let's say you have two years from me asking the question to give me an answer. That is more than fair. It's been over a year, and I have fulfilled your initial terms plus an abundance more. I have taken you on a date to Hogsmeade, we have done other activities that occur between those that date, I have a house, I have money, you have your own money, and I have assisted you with your chosen career path, to the best of my abilities. You continue to find me deficient, and wish to experiment with others to prove to yourself that I am inferior."

"Stop being such a toerag."

His brow furrowed, and he asked, "Have I ever done that sort of thing to you? I could shove you out into the street and charm off your clothes. Is that what's wrong with me? I don't find that amusing? I only pick on those that deserve it, rather than anyone that annoys me? Should I set the headmaster's beard on fire? Spell his candies to choke him? The same with Slughorn's? Or poison his liquor? All jolly good pranks?"

"They are not jolly good."

"I think about defense. And defense is not about attacking everyone who crosses my path. That's heroic? Drawing the attention to oneself, daring all comers to attack? That's what you find wrong with me, Lily. I want to minimize the number of people wanting me dead. If people persist in attacking me, I will make it hard for them to continue. Britain is bordering on anarchy. I cannot use the laws in place that were written to protect all citizens because they are no longer enforced. That is why I consider moving elsewhere.

"At the moment, more than half the country is cowering in their homes waiting for Death Eaters to target someone in their family. As long as they are quiet and keep their heads down, maybe next door will end up with a Dark Mark over their house, instead of them. That's one of the chief causes to join up as a Death Eater. It's better to be the bully, than the person cowering in the cellar every night. The current defense is only around the Ministry officials they feel worth protecting. Everyone else gets a pamphlet, and the news they see fit to print in the newspaper. The public is not told when someone successfully defends themselves against Death Eaters."

"Has anyone?"

"If muggles can, I'm sure there has to be a wizard or witch clever enough to do it. He Who Must Not Be Named might send twice as many the next time to keep that person quiet, but we'll never know with the Ministry controlling the paper and claiming the only way that they can be fought is allowing the government to cast Unforgivables at will. The number of obituaries has not declined since that passed. That's the only indicator the public at large has."

Lily shook her head slightly. That had to be Lovegood.

"You'll probably want the heroic, stand-alone type, rather than one that would organize a resistance that would help his neighbors when they need it. So it'll be the two of you against whoever he taunts to show up on your doorstep. You might want to practice running since there is nothing that shields against a killing curse."

"Isn't that a bit overly dramatic, Sev?"

"You planning on not answering the door when they knock?"

Lily rolled her eyes. "I know the words to the killing curse too."

"Alive in Azkaban? I guess that's preferable than leaving your corpse beneath your husband's when he uses you as a shield."

"Why would I go to jail?"

"Unforgivable is a life offense for anyone not employed by the Ministry. Until you get that job, you would be guilty whether it's a Death Eater, werewolf, or He Who Must Not Be Named himself."

"Why aren't Death Eaters in jail then?"

"They don't individually take credit. They want to be seen, but wear masks so they cannot be identified or photographed."

"Seems cowardly."

"Effective," Severus argued.

*********************************

Lily spent the afternoon thinking while doing some extra Divination calculations. If she had some idea of what could happen, maybe it would help.

Marry someone who would use her as a shield … yeah, there were even Gryffindors that would do that sort of thing. At least she knew Sev would not do that based on what he did against Lupin as a werewolf. Even if she told Sev to kiss off now, which she did not want to do, there was still that life debt. How would she pay that back if Sev moved to … Australia? New Zealand? Canada? He was angry about the past week, even though he said he wasn't. Why couldn't he just say it?

Severus seemed willing to believe that Lily would not marry him. Strangely though, he wanted Lily to put it into words. Or one word. Would he accept it, if she did say 'no'? Potter never believed her. Severus was not Potter, and Lily was positive Potter was just being a toerag and used that as an excuse to talk to her, or show up on her front porch here. Like she'd ever go out with that conceited and arrogant quidditch player. Severus was the opposite, maybe too much the opposite with his comments about how insignificant he and everything he touched were. Lily knew he was not trying to trick her into complimenting him since she heard quite enough people berating him. Severus was raised with a litany of being told he was worthless, and at Hogwarts he was called talentless. Lily thought he was brilliant. Even after she started school with him. It wasn't till she started earnestly studying with him that she saw the intuitive leaps he made, and then he'd backtrack and explain every step between the cause and reason to her. Severus didn't pepper the explanations to her with insults, though she'd hear him do it to others enough. Until he started to get used to them. His insults regarding Mary were not about her schoolwork, and he could be decent when talking to some of the Slytherins and maybe a Ravenclaw.

The strange thing was Lily could imagine herself married to Severus, and not only when she was really mad at Petunia. Their six weeks in a caravan had been lovely. Even though it was sort of new to them both, he had been obliging in everything. Severus usually was. When he didn't do as she asked, he told her. Not like on the telly, or even sometimes with her dad, where they'd shrug and say they forgot. Severus even remembered flowers on Valentine's Day, when his parents died earlier that month. Lily had not been gracious to him because she had been mad at Mary. Why did Severus even bother? Lily could admit she did not reciprocate properly, was demanding, and she really had no clue to what Severus was thinking, even when he said it. And now, he gave her permission to shag any wizard she fancied. He did, didn't he? Did Sev want her to leave him? Maybe. After a week of being on his own, he may be back to his 'no one likes me', 'I have no friends', and 'I'm always alone' mentality. The only sticking point was Lily. Maybe Mary, if she could tackle him and drag him off. Lily was not so sure about the Slytherin boys. Slytherins were a strange bunch, even with Sev's insider view. If Severus was a Head Boy to be reckoned with, he'd have friends, or allies, and then there'd also be enemies. What did Sev plan to do as Head Boy? Lily knew he volunteered to start any of her ideas if she was not feeling up to it when school started. Lily should write to Prof. McGonagall. She did not want to disappoint her, and Severus was thinking clearly about that. He did not sound like he wanted to take over any project in particular, and she laughed thinking of him trying to steal the credit for coming up with the idea of a fancy dress party. Severus Snape loved parties? Only if he stayed behind to have the library all to himself.

When Severus returned, he was in his new trousers and jumper, had his Wigtown Wanderers badge pinned to it, and was carrying a full sack of groceries and a couple big books.

Lily made a face. Mum had asked for milk, but there was a couple other things she needed, and Severus apparently did not mind picking up for her. Why was Sev nice to her mum? Even now?

"Crumpets?" Lily asked, when she saw them on the counter.

"They don't stay fresh forever."

She was in the middle of rolling her eyes, when Lily caught Severus looking at her strange. Now what? Crumpets were not a staple. They had plenty of other things for tea.

"So what did Gumboil want?"

"I'm not really sure. I was asked questions about improprieties at Hogwarts. Maybe someone came up with something crazy about why I was Head Boy, but I think Gumboil seeing me again cleared that up."

"What do you mean?"

"If the female staff was going to approach a male student and dangle their favors in front of him, I think they'd pick a better looking one."

"What?"

"They think teachers are trading their influence, or whatever Slughorn does to get students apprenticeships and jobs, for sex with students. I told them I didn't know anything about that. Gifts, yes, but not that. I mean look at the staff, who'd be lining up for that?"

Lily made a face and said, "Who'd believe that? Is there anyone even under … I don't know, fifty there?"

"Mr. Filch isn't fifty yet. McGonagall and Sprout might be around that. Maybe Hooch?"

"Any other men?"

"Mr. Hagrid?"

"Ugh."

Mrs. Evans shook her head, and commented, "It's better it get investigated. I've heard terrible things about some of those Church schools in Ireland."

For Severus' sake, Lily added, "Catholic."

"What's that mean?" he asked Lily.

"That's the religion that still takes orders from the Pope in Rome."

"He tells them to do terrible things to school children?"

"Cor Blimey," Mrs. Evans exclaimed.

"Never mind, Sev. It's just that muggle schools hide things too, and it's best to look into anything like that, even if you have to be bothered going to London."

"It wasn't so bad. Gumboil seems alright for a Ministry sort. He didn't get overly suggestive or ask leading questions, or even suggest what I should say."

"So they're after Slughorn, you think?"

"No, definitely a woman. I did mention Pomfrey, but was clear she was not offering me any sort of deal."

Lily laughed, "Let's see her explain that one."

"She's the school nurse, Lily."

"Still, if she won't treat you when you're injured, it seems silly to say she wants you to take off your clothes when she catches sight of you sitting around talking to Mary and I."

"What?" her mother asked.

"He didn't do it, mum. You know how stubborn Sev is, he opted for detention."

"Besides what could Pomfrey offer me besides detention? She might talk to the other staff, but I don't think without having me in class, she could persuade others I was Head Boy material. I only have two female teachers."

"Prof. McGonagall or Prof. Sprout? That's crazy," declared Lily.

"They are Heads of Houses, and not my house. It would look mighty peculiar if they went against house allegiance."

"There's no Gryffindor boys left."

"So? There's two of you. One's head girl and the other's head boy. Plenty of Scottish women are more masculine than the lads of other countries. Her argument to nominate her two Gryffindors for the two available positions makes perfect sense."

Lily laughed, "I'm lucky I got Head Girl. My house is an embarrassment."

"Change it than."

She sobered, "How?"

"Gryffindors have tons of pride. If that doesn't work, get their privileges whittled away. We know points and the House Cup mean nothing to them."

"I can't take privileges away."

"McGonagall can. You name names. There's detention. With McGonagall, not Slughorn. Get quidditch players suspended for a game. Hogsmeade weekends are not a right. Attending your dance is also by invitation. I know McGonagall's not happy with that lot."

"What about the other houses?"

"If points work for them, it'll even out. It depends. I'll give it some thought. We might have to improvise. Speaking of your dance, I stopped at our library in town and got some art books. All the big heroes have statues."

Lily smiled and said, "Now you're thinking."

"I flipped through them, and I think if you'd like to be Perseus, I would not mind being a monstrous Medusa. If MacDonald is stuck for something, she can be Andromeda. Perseus saves and marries her on his way back from killing Medusa."

"What do you mean by monstrous?"

"Rather than being a beautiful woman with live snakes for hair, I can still have a fair face, but scales on my skin and perhaps clawed hands. If we're able to get statues of victims into the room in advance, it may add to the atmosphere."

"Oh yeah, she turns people into stone."

"So Perseus' shield will be mirrored on one side."

"He's nude in a lot of these."

"That was the artistic style for Greeks. It's a short toga, sandals, short sword, shield and helm."

"You're really not going to dress up as a boy?" Mrs. Evans asked her daughter.

"There's spells, mum. They'll never guess if I'm a boy, and Sev's a girl. Get it?"

*********************************

ANs: I realize that I am reading another story in progress where Mr. Evans met his end. However, I really did have his demise planned because by 1981, both Lily's parents are gone, making Petunia and Dudley Harry's only living blood relatives.

Perhaps Lily's parents died around the same time as Potter's, and they bonded over that common experience while still in school. That may have been what also matured James. I think Harry's photos lacked grandparents, so all four may have passed prior to Lily and James marrying. I would guess them married in 1978 or 1979, because Harry was born in 1980.

Also, you didn't really think I'd really send Severus Snape to Walt Disney World, did you? LOL

Is it possible to stay angry listening to Jamming by Bob Marley? Reggae vs. the Dark Arts.

BTW, my house was built in 1910, and has exposed pipes outside the walls because they were added later. The fat sewer pipe from the upstairs lavatory that dropped through the kitchen got a fake wall built to hide it when I got some cabinet work done. The skinny pipes that supply heat upstairs are still out in the open in the downstairs' rooms. I'm not sure how the house was heated prior to those being added because there is no fireplace. I'm guessing a wood or coal burning stove, but I do know that among the other houses on this street built at the same time, there is one fireplace in the house directly across the street. Its placement matches up to where the rest of us have the furnace chimney running up through the middle of the house from the basement.


	46. Chapter 46 Beginning of the End

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 46 The Beginning of the End

… referring to the last year at Hogwarts :^)

Lily's last week of the summer holiday was tense. Severus was back to his normal paranoid self about the Ministry, the school, and everyone in general, and was also perfectly fine to her. He didn't mention marriage, deadlines, or Lily's quest to shag any wizard she wanted.

She was confused and angry, and her apprehension worsened as mum seemed to think it totally natural to give Sev a shopping list every day. He also repaired the nicked tiles in the bath for her. Lily could have done that. All mum needed to do was ask, but instead she goes and bothers Severus over it.

When she got Sev on his own, and complained to him, he did agree it was temporary since he was going back to school with Lily. However, for now he saw no harm with helping Mrs. Evans. Lily attempted to tell him it was better for her mum to be relieved they were gone, rather than sitting around moaning how she missed them.

"Why would Petunia let her moan about missing me?"

"What?"

"She's going to Surrey after she sees us off on the train."

"No, she's not."

"If you say so. Anyway, I got her gardening all up to date, and will trim the grass real short that last day for her. If she decides to go somewhere in the near future."

Lily glared out the window. Someone had laid a lot more mulch around mum's roses, and the grass was a decent height, despite no one using the lawnmower since her dad passed. She hissed, "What if someone sees you?"

"I do it at night. I know you don't want my sort to even be seen doing your yardwork."

"That's not what I meant. You don't use the lawnmower, and you're probably pushing around … whatever with magic."

In annoyance, he snapped, "I got things of my own to do. I don't have time to do things the proper, muggle way. Your garden always looks good so no one'll notice some magical maintenance. What is your problem anyway? I realize I'm the only one lowly enough to handle taking your rubbish out, but you could do something around here."

"Oh stop whinging about rubbish and being seen doing our yardwork."

"You were the one whinging. If you don't like the manner in which I'm doing things, then do it yourself."

"It's not that. Mum's got to adjust and you are making it harder for her."

"I'm not sure I agree with that, Lily," Severus slowly replied, thinking about how helpful people were to him. He received more assistance from goblins than wizards. Especially if he discounted his solicitor, who was paid to work for him.

Lily bit off an insensitive retort, then changed to, "I know you're used to doing things for yourself, and my mum's got to get more like that."

"What if she doesn't want to? She seemed content, maybe happy, taking care of things here. Now it's just her, and when you're home, Lily."

In her mind, Lily agreed with what he was saying, but he was making it harder by not even letting mum go to the store for herself.

********************************

Lily finished packing her trunk. Sev was going to meet them here with his. He had been right. Why did her mum talk to Severus more than she talked to her own daughter? Mum was coming with them to see them off for their last train ride to school tomorrow, and then she was taking the train to Surrey to visit Petunia for a bit.

He also was practical and took the bulk of mum's bags to Petunia's last night so she wouldn't be burdened with them. Lily had been on the phone extension and was delighted to listen to Tunie's horror over the freak knowing where she lived. At least she didn't get all toerag and insist that it was better for their mother to carry all that on her own. Sev had made the mountain of luggage small, then made it big outside Tunie's back door, and left. Not even a cup of tea. Lily grinned considering how quickly Petunia forgot she planned to be the perfect hostess.

Having been subjected to mum's checklist multiple times, Lily moaned to see it reappear when she thought they were all set to go, now that Severus was here. Her mouth dropped open as Lily realized that this time mum was reviewing the entire list, and it included Severus. Was the house in Spinner's End locked up? Did he have every last thing under the sun in his trunk? Her mum had gone completely insane.

Lily supposed mum must be a little mad since she wanted to do wizard things with them. The lost opportunity at portkeying to America was still an experience that would need to wait, but for today, Mrs. Evans wanted to 'blend in' and travel with them to Diagon Alley by apparating to their closest floo point.

If they found Mrs. Evans could not use the floo, they'd have to apparate the rest of the way in manageable distances. Severus had mapped out that possibility so they were able to accomplish that in as few pops as necessary, even though Mrs. Evans claimed she took some sort of medicine that would prevent her from feeling ill. He did not understand how muggles had medicine for apparition, but Lily was agreeable to her mother's claim that it worked wonders for sea sickness.

Their journey was disappointingly lacking in adventure to Lily's eyes. The three of them apparated without any problem, with her and mum holding tightly to each other's hands, while Sev took both her owl cage and Phi perched on his shoulder. He took out his tin of floo powder, opened it to the Leaky Cauldron, stepped aside to allow Lily and her mother to go through, and they both ended up at the old pub in London with Severus following them once he confirmed he had been left alone on that end.

"That was quick," Mrs. Evans stated.

"Yeah, a lot of their houses have a fireplace connected to that network so coming down here, or going shopping in Hogsmeade is no problem for them. They can also use it for making a sort of phone call too," Lily explained.

Severus glanced around at the run-down place. He had warned Mrs. Evans that the rooms here might be as dismal as the downstairs. He did not expect someplace as tidy as the hotel room they were in last year. Especially since the price was ridiculously low when he compared galleons to pounds, or even more cut-rate in American dollars when viewed against the room for Lily's fabulous trip to Walter Something World with mice, castles and paddle boats.

He put Lily's owl down, and asked, "Did you want to see if we can take our things upstairs? If we need to, we have plenty of time to kill fleas and lice."

"Sev!," Lily admonished.

"Wizards may deny it, but they died just as easily during the plagues of the Dark Ages. That was caused by bacteria in fleas living on rats."

Lily was letting out an exasperated sigh when she saw the unsavory looking fellow behind the bar scratch his balding head. With a sharp glance to Severus, she double checked he was not jinxing the guy. Unfortunately his wand was nowhere in sight.

"At least it's not the Hog's Head," Severus mentioned to her before he went over to talk over his reservation.

She rolled her eyes. The Hog's Head always smelled of some sort of animals or something, besides having worse lighting, dirtier everything, and private dining rooms where older students could shag each other on the tables after drinking themselves silly.

"I know Severus is just kidding around," Mrs. Evans told her daughter.

"Yeah," Lily agreed, since her mum looked sort of happy. They had cut through the Leaky Cauldron before to go to Diagon Alley, since muggles had no other way. This time, Lily supposed they could have flooed directly to someplace else in there with a fireplace.

"How bad can it be? It's only one night, and it'll give me an appreciation for how … your kind lives."

"My kind?"

"Lily, I've known for years that you were lured in by it all. How could you go back to the way things were when you were little? You're not giving up magic."

"I don't have to give it up, mum. I'm sure there's some who prefer living with electricity and admit some of our stuff is better. Even Severus prefers our music."

"Severus lives like us."

"He doesn't have electricity."

"That wasn't his choice."

"I think he uses magic for a lot of things. He merely doesn't go flaunting it."

"That's fine."

Lily was no longer sure her mother was speaking about the same thing she was. What was fine about Severus? He couldn't go attacking muggles and breaking the secrecy statute. Severus thought before he acted, and he knew right from wrong. He may get even with bullies, but he never did anything to her when they were fighting. Well, not fighting, arguing. Lily doubted she'd get in much more than a couple jinxes if Severus wanted to defend himself. He could be lightning quick and vicious. Sev was careful not to truly hurt anyone. Just their pride, which was more precious to the toerags of the world.

Was that her problem? Pride? Although she felt she had an ongoing competition with Petunia, did Lily need a successful businessman like Vernon? Or was it Vernon's ability to converse with others, tell jokes and general social amiability? Did she need a three bedroom house? A kitchen full of the latest appliances? A nice car in the driveway framed by a well-kept garden? What was the wizard version? A three bedroom house with a fireplace connected to the floo … a stove? … brooms? After seeing Prof. Moonshine's kitchen, with Tess hovering about it most of the day, maybe Lily wanted something closer to a muggle kitchen and home with the fireplace too. A television would be nice. Not the ridiculous trend of putting one in every room, but one to watch for a couple hours in the evening. Get the news from the world outside and maybe catch a good movie. Lily missed that in the wizarding world. They had books. Lily was not against reading, but sometimes the telly or a movie were what she preferred.

Severus came back to them and said, "I have the keys. You can take your pick, unless we change our minds once we see them."

"Always negative, Sev," Lily replied. "Let's go."

The stairs were not well-lit and the upstairs corridor snaked away in different directions without any hallway visibly straight to see the length of it. Severus felt muggles kept it simple as he looked at the room numbers. First number was the floor, and then there was clear signage when one got off the elevator, or got to the top of the stairs, in this case.

He saw doors for room eight and eleven to the right, two and fifteen straight ahead, and twenty-two and thirty to the left. "We're eighteen and nineteen, if you'd like to guess."

"Maybe straight," Lily ventured.

They found them down that corridor. The rooms adjoined with a bath between them. Severus had understood the arrangement for other rooms to use a common bath nearby, but he didn't think any of them would like that.

Lily was disappointed. Both rooms were drab and boring. Even Hogwarts' dormitories were more nicely decorated. She suspected mum was equally unimpressed when she joined her at the dirty window looking onto muggle London. Maybe wizards thought that was an exotic view.

She could hear Severus in the bath since the water ran briefly then stopped. He came in and asked, "Did you want this one?"

"Either one, Severus," replied Mrs. Evans. Since Lily's owl was here, they took this one.

For their afternoon adventure, following a lunch at the Leaky Cauldron, the Evans' ladies decided to stop in every shop on their way to look it over.

Severus did not mind stores with books, but he needed nothing for quidditch, pranking, celebrating with fireworks, or an ice cream treat.

He smirked at Lily's desire to sound knowledgeable to her mother when she slipped to say she had been in the jewelry store before to look at engagement rings with him.

"Just to look around," Lily protested. "I wanted to see what was different about them. Petunia's is traditional, but I don't want some rock just sitting there in a claw."

When she looked to him for confirmation, Severus was not helpful by saying, "I tried to tell Lily I would prefer not to live with something that was distracting. Something twitchy, like that," he said, pointing to some animated glob of stone that was twinkling and gyrating around in its setting, "or something that made noise. An initial poem or song may seem romantic, but not every time it feels in the mood."

"You were shopping for an engagement ring with Severus?" Mrs. Evans asked again, repeating her initial question.

"I said I wanted to look."

Mrs. Evans gave her daughter a sharp glare and walked out of the store. She could not reprimand her daughter in front of Severus; it would have to wait till later. Taking him to look at engagement rings when Lily said she was not interested in him that way. Was she expecting some future suitor to consult Severus regarding which style she preferred?

"She knows we weren't here in the past couple weeks, Lily."

"She's being unreasonable," Lily replied following her mother out.

After a couple more stops, Mrs. Evans was back to herself. In Gringotts, she asked, "Can we see what a vault looks like, Severus?"

"They only take me to mine. The ride's bumpy, dark and uncomfortable."

"Do you need to go to yours?"

Severus thought and was sure that his original vault, his mother's, was not bursting with gold and treasure. That's where he stored the books from Spinner's End, and he had moved some money there, in case the others were taken away. "I guess you can come. Let me see if I can find a talkative goblin to explain the bank."

While Severus was off to find a friendly goblin, Lily asked, "How'd you do that? I've never been to Sev's vault."

"You are usually with us. Your father and I change muggle money at the counter."

"I know, but … I don't know … isn't it kind of personal to ask to see someone's vault?"

"It might. Severus did not complain, and he knows that we're aware of his financial situation."

If Lily was willing to reveal to her mother that she now had a vault, she'd rather take her there. What if Sev's was only a couple coins outnumbered by cobwebs? She crossed her arms over her chest and looked over to where Severus had a couple goblins looking up at him. Didn't he need to wait in line? Lily saw other students and their families queued up, and that line was not moving. It was glacially slow whenever the Evans waited in it.

Severus gestured them over, and said, "Hodnuk, one of the clerks, knows the history of the bank and is free to take us down to my vault."

"Your key, Mr. Snape?"

He showed Hodnuk the Prince key.

"Follow me please."

Hodnuk instructed them to keep their hands and arms in the cart, besides not standing while it was in motion. The goblin drove at a slow speed that Severus had never known was possible and talked about goblins and Gringotts on their ride down to the Prince vault.

Severus should not have been worried about having approximately a thousand galleons stacked in there because Lily went crazy over seeing all his boxed books there.

"What are they doing here?" Lily asked. "And why didn't you tell me?"

"I told you I was packing them."

"You can't read them while they're here."

"I've already seen them."

Lily folded her arms over her chest in annoyance. There was nothing counting the number of galleons Severus had in here. If she could go to her vault, Lily could compare the pile to hers of five thousand.

They did not stay long, but Severus took a handful of coins to cover he had not needed to visit here.

Once they returned upstairs, Hodnuk also exchanged Mrs. Evans muggle money for galleons so they could purchase Lily's supplies, without asking them to get in line.

The rest of the afternoon was stopping for replacement uniform items, owl treats and a knotted rope with a bell on the end that Phi chose, quills, parchment, ink and then they put their items away and went out to muggle London to have dinner.

Once Lily and her mother were alone in their room that evening, the quiet bickering began with both occasionally looking towards the bathroom to make sure Severus overheard nothing. After his brief visit to the lavatory earlier, he had stayed in his room. He was still awake because they could see light under the bathroom door on his side.

By the time they retired, Mrs. Evans fears that her daughter was insensitive towards Severus were confirmed. She also had a irrational streak of jealousy towards her because Lily felt her friend should be solely devoted to pleasing her.

Lily had not considered that her mother was allowing Severus to do as he liked for her to alleviate his guilt over his own mother. There was no rational reason why he should feel that way, but Lily had heard him say it. Her mum wasn't the mess his mum had been. She could cook for herself, clean up after herself, leave the house whenever she liked, and could interact with people. Her mum didn't need Severus for anything. Why did Sev have to be so mental? And on top of that, doing nice things while being a nutter.

Lying on her side, Lily looked through the bathroom at the light under his door. Sev still had his books and even if there was nothing to indicate how many galleons that was, Lily was sure there was definitely more than a couple hundred. However, a furnace, an electrician and a plumber were expensive, even with a galleon roughly equaling five pounds, Lily did not think he had enough to get Spinner's End fixed up proper, even if he did do some of the work himself.

She wished her mum snored like Severus so she'd know when it was safe to get up.

It was dark. Lily floundered a bit and realized she had fallen asleep. She slid out of bed and went over to the bathroom, confirming that their door had not been closed. It was dark under the connecting door to Sev's room. If she knocked, it could wake her mum. Had Sev stayed up a long time waiting for her?

She got her wand and returned to the bathroom, closing their door and then waving her wand to turn on the lights here. Lily was frustrated when _alohomora _did not work. What was that spell? She was muttering so much that Phi finally told her to shut up.

While Lily made faces, Severus went over to the door and asked, "What?"

"Sev, open up."

He cracked the door for Lily and said, "Your mother's an early riser. Go back to bed. She'll hear you."

"I'm sorry."

"For what?"

"I fell asleep."

"I rather you did. With us leaving today, it's the wrong time to get caught. Your mother seemed to enjoy yesterday."

"Why do you worry so much about my mum?"

He made a face at Lily, and replied, "Why wouldn't I? She's never meant me harm."

"But she's my mum."

"That makes her important to you. You don't have to keep telling me that."

"So why were you up so late?"

"Working on something. I'll need the library at school for more information, but there was more equations I could set up."

"You were doing Arithmancy?"

"That sounds a lot better than Phi bringing me small animals from the alley below that I killed and reanimated through the Dark Arts to join my horde of minions."

"Reanimate?"

"Things can't be brought to true life so that's why the word reanimate is used."

"With everything you know, why do you want to study to be a Potions Master?"

"I like Potions, and it'll let me work mostly on my own. Dark Arts is for aurors or Gringott curse breakers. I don't want to work for either the Ministry or goblins. Arithmancy is academic unless applied to another field. Prof. Abstractus sort of branches into Healing, but he's more interested in the pattern of people getting sick."

"So what's your current project?"

"It's still theoretical. If successful, it would be good for people, if that's what you're worried about. Not as trivial as augury eyes, and may be a bigger impact than my substitute for unicorn lung."

"Unicorn lung?"

"It should be published soon. It's used in powerful respiratory cures."

"How much lung is needed? With unicorns being endangered … I mean they have to weigh the life of a wizard or witch against that, and if it's just a little bit or big piece … Sev, that's good. I mean really great that you found that."

"Uh, thanks."

"Do you make money from that?"

"No, I can't. I couldn't do the testing myself so I had to share what I suspected with someone else. Then because Prof. Abstractus prefers to share his work with anyone, he found a like-minded Potions Master. Though if he hadn't found this fellow, I doubt any discovery would have been made or confirmed at all."

"Saving lives of people and unicorns … yeah, alright. This one you're working on, will save lives?"

"It will, but it's a substitute for an expensive substance that is rare at times."

"Would you be able to keep the recipe a secret?"

"Maybe. There's a lot of variables. I might not even hypothetically come up with something workable, or the possible ingredients may be costly. Once I'm apprenticed, I'll have access to a potions laboratory. That will surely be something I insist on in the contract. If it can wait, I should not publicly acknowledge any discovery while I'm apprenticed because my Master will garner a larger share of the credit."

"For your work?"

"An apprentice is simply an apprentice."

"Hm," Lily fumed. "Well, maybe you can get cracking on this before he comes along and test it at Hogwarts."

"Slughorn restricts his equipment to his favorites."

"Throw your scrawny Head Boy weight around, or use someone else's office. Jeez. And where's your pin?"

"I'm in my nightshirt."

"Be a berk and wear it to bed. So you'll start acting like a Head Boy. And try to do more than lurk in the train compartment today. I'm sure the prefects know we'll work together, but don't let them know that you don't care what's going on."

"I don't care about insignificant minutiae. Can't I act like I trust in their abilities to take points?"

"No. Get thinking. I want to be dazzled by your brilliance."

The thought crossed Severus' mind that all he had to do was lift the front hem of his nightshirt. "Alright, I'll think about it. Leave the lights lit in here for your mother. There's no switch."

"Hey," Lily exclaimed, stopping Sev from closing his door.

"What?"

"You haven't kissed me yet today."

Severus gave in to her demand. Lily was confusing. Was this some act because they were returning to school?

********************************

Lily insisted Severus remain with her on Platform 9 ¾, since their compartment at the front of the train would be held for them. Both of them had on their Head badges and their Wigtown Wanderer pins. She used their time before 11 o'clock to direct new first years, greet other students and smirk at the shock of those that realized who the Head Boy was.

Severus was subdued, waiting for any other male student wearing a Head Boy badge to point him out as an impostor. He did not show up by eleven, and was not in the front compartment reserved for the Head Boy and Head Girl. Even after MacDonald joined them, Severus kept his eye on the compartment door until long after they departed King's Cross.

He let Lily explain why MacDonald was here to any prefect that entered and protested her presence. The compartment was crowded, but one person alone did not make the difference. Severus even decided to stand with his back to the outside window, rather than have the progressive budging up leave him with no room in the corner seat.

Crouch was appointed prefect over Regulus Black. Severus did not think that kind of Slughorn since Crouch was studying for twelve OWLs. Another thought that struck Severus was Sirius Black had not been made a prefect. Nor Potter. All their boasting about how important they were, and their sycophant, Lupin, got it? Prof. McGonagall was left with a poor choice from those four, but she should have at least considered her holiday gifts.

The door was left open so others could stand outside, Lily stood in the center and as far as Severus could tell, she was rambling. He had heard her ideas before, however he expected her to present them in some logical order, or even refer to a written list. He had never attended one of these meetings before, but if this was the standard, it explained the erratic duties of the prefects from year to year.

If he thought Lily was long-winded, the questions she was asked were moronic and repetitive. Severus stared at Phi, who was safe on the luggage rack, to keep his feelings off his face. There was an obsession with what to do with sick younger students with different scenarios being presented involving regurgitation. Other symptoms varied, but the puking remained an important factor. If everyone was so concerned about such ailments, they should be a little more careful about what they ate instead of trying to imitate locusts.

Once the matter of what to do with someone who was suffering from whatever projectile vomiting was, along with it shooting out their behinds and a nose bleed, the contest to imagine the messiest first year was over. After twenty minutes of that, following Lily's thirty, Severus was hoping this was over, but no, even his minor hopes were ignored.

Lily made some sort of waving motion with her hand towards him and said, "Now Severus has some things he'd like to cover."

The pained look on his face was mirrored by a few of the prefects. "Evans and all of you have covered everything major. Some of you have been here over an hour already so I'll just add one brief thing. I had to think up something that was new. I'm new at this, and thought of what I could do to help students. I'm not interested in helping the staff. I don't know if that's what prefects think they're doing, but for the students I feel the majority of pranks at Hogwarts are not done in the proper spirit, but bullying. Knocking girls down the stairs and down the hill on their way to Herbology was never funny. A group of older students planting a first year face down in a urinal is not original."

"Are you suggesting we come up with better jokes?"

"Not necessarily. Putting an end to the injuries first should be the priority."

"How?"

"We have to think. Supposedly we're a little brighter, but if not, we can be less predictable."

"Perhaps we can make it fun for ourselves," Lily suggested. "Not by alienating our own houses or taking points, but seeing how many we can catch … or sharing their ridiculous excuses and presenting some bogus award to the biggest liar."

Severus did not understand what Lily was saying. Fun? Why did she ask him to contribute if she was going to twist what he said? Awards for attacking others and lying. Less than an hour ago she was talking about Parkin. Did Black, Potter, Lupin and Pettigrew deserve an award for that?

"I don't know. Some of them would rather hex us, than give an excuse."

Severus shrugged, "Get better at shield charms. If not, get their names, or remember what they look like and point them out to us at meals. Most of these acts aren't anonymous, except for the skirts and blouses. Whoever's attacking the female students specifically are doing it when it's crowded."

"'Cause they're cowards," Lily muttered. All those little wretches who worshiped the Marauders were cowardly toerags.

"Or using it to cover their activity. It's too obvious if the lady's with only one other student. On the other hand, it could be as a sort of show. That could be their goal with casting it. However, their conceit is so enormous that they aren't realizing that very few people are enjoying it."

Barty was listening attentively, trying to think how Reg and him could use this to their advantage. Conceit? It was more like he enjoyed looking at boobs and didn't want to be caught. It would be more than tricking Snape. Some of the male prefects could think normally about why someone would target the female students.

Severus did not think his idea would garner much interest. Lily's slant of making it a frivolous enjoyment did not help.

The lot of them cleared out and he resumed his seat, while MacDonald and Lily talked about her grand ideas. As Severus had suspected, Lily did not tell MacDonald to her face that she was not welcome to join them at the fancy dress party. MacDonald was suggesting feminine disguises to Lily for the two of them to dress up in. At least MacDonald was thinking of herself first as Aphrodite, with Lily as Athena. With absolutely no encouragement from him, they argued between themselves over what suited him best. The witches decided on Hermes by default since Severus was not fair enough to be Apollo, nor muscled or manly enough to be Ares or Hephaestus. At least they had the good sense not to choose Cupid or Eros. He might not mind Hades, but that was discarded since neither wanted to be Persephone. Severus could care less, and might be happier to declare he was not attending, if he had to listen to two months of his attributes being described in their objective manner for them to best decide.

He had a passing knowledge to know that Elizabeth I was queen of England centuries ago, but no idea who was being suggested as her costumed companions. Lily did not want a big dress so he did not have to find out.

The two of them went easy when the trolley came round. In other words, no meat meant no interest.

MacDonald brought up an interesting dilemma or blessing. She would now room alone since Lily was head girl. Severus had not given that any thought. Any previous Slytherin head boys or head girls used their common room. He never followed them to see where they went. Severus would like to room alone. That definitely sounded like a privilege. Privileges could be taken away. It was more likely that after detention each evening with Mr. Filch, Severus could have the privilege of curling up on the floor either next to the filing cabinets or perhaps in the hall outside.

"Sev?" Lily asked, waving a bitten pumpkin pasty at him.

"What?" he replied, turning away from the dark window.

"What's got you so moody over there?"

"I hate Hogwarts."

"Something new that you hate?"

"Not really."

"Why do you hate school?" Mary asked. "You're good at it."

He made a face and went back to looking out the window. Hogwarts was hardly about academics.

Severus found he did not need to say anything further. Lily was answering MacDonald's question. At length. She was saying things that he considered little more than an annoyance. If he tried to correct her, she'd just tell him that he did not know what he was talking about. He should feel honored that she was validating his opinion in the first place.

This train ride was too long.

********************************

When they reached the station, Lily was already urging both MacDonald and Severus to assist first years. He doubted that they needed to. It was sort of a test as to how stupid they were. Who would miss Hagrid yelling or choose to intentionally go another way?

Severus hadn't. Neither had Lily. They rode over together in a boat, excited and holding each others' hands.

Now MacDonald was with them in the carriage, and the two of them still had things to say to each other. Severus sarcastically hoped for that floor in Mr. Filch's office. Mrs. Norris would stare at him, but she would be staring quietly.

At the Slytherin table, Severus got a lot of glances, besides insults. He had not done anything for this badge so all the taunts were meaningless. He did not imitate Lily's enthusiasm for the position, but clapped politely whenever a Slytherin was sorted.

There were quite a few Slytherins overthinking the situation. Snape had done something. Not the juvenile taunts about him doing 'favors' for the staff, but something more substantial. Something that apparently worked, and that the half-blood was getting away with. The Dark Lord was rumored to be leery of Albus Dumbledore, but a seventeen year old had been running circles around him for the past year. What clinched it was when Filch came over and told Snape he no longer had detention every night. Yeah, Snape had done something.

During the school song, Severus kept his mouth firmly shut. It had been a couple years since he participated in this spectacle. Since he lost his faith that 'this year would be better'.

Dinner was alright. Crouch had done as asked, and had a copy of both the OWL and NEWT testing standards for Defense from the Ministry. It was not the answers, but the subjects that students were supposed to know for each test. Severus glanced at it, and wondered why Hogwarts did not base their course curriculum on these topics, rather than letting each instructor choose what interested them. Now that Crouch and Black were fifth years, both were interested in a Defense study group and especially did not mind that a NEWT level student would lead it. Black played quidditch for Slytherin and planned on doing it again this year so Severus was willing to wait before scheduling anything firm. They could meet either Friday evening or over the weekend to outline what they should cover and a review schedule to get them ready for the OWL, and if only Severus and Lily were interested in the NEWT level, they could handle it between them.

Severus joined the fifth year prefects with the new first years to walk down to the dungeon. The prefects were enjoying their new authority and were talking about the history of Slytherin within Hogwarts.

The fifth year prefect when Severus was sorted was Lucius Malfoy. He had taken an instant liking to Malfoy. There was something about the way Malfoy looked, and the way Malfoy spoke that Severus admired. He had heard that Malfoy was supposed to marry Sirius and Regulus Black's cousin. Regulus only mentioned that she was 'the blond one'. Severus thought he remembered an older Black girl with blond hair in Slytherin. She never spoke to him, but older Slytherins rarely did more than demand that younger students get out of their way.

Malfoy had seemed friendly to him on that first night. Severus was flattered, and didn't even think that he was being asked so many questions because he was the only student not expected in Slytherin that year. Even once Malfoy knew what he wanted to know, he hadn't been insulting or dismissive. He could have been a right royal bastard like Potter and Black. Malfoy's family may even be wealthier than the two of theirs. People like Malfoy did not politely request half-blood scum from Spinner's End to pass a trifle during afters, but Malfoy had. Someone at Hogwarts, other than Lily, was interested in him.

He left after one of the new, little dunderheads inquired if he had dragonpox. What else could it be? If it was another disease, like the couple the muggles got, or horrible acne, that could be treated.

Severus continued down the sloping hallway for the boys' dormitories when he wondered if Slughorn should have told him something. If there were only four beds in the room, he'd have a good idea that either he shouldn't be there, or Mulciber decided that he could move on with his life without his History of Magic NEWT.

The question answered itself since next to the door that was usually lowest the corridor for seventh years ended in the Head Boy door with a plaque with his name on it. His name was the password and Severus immediately changed it. He drew his wand in case someone decided to rely on Slughorn's predictability and waited for him inside.

Whoever decided it was a good idea to make the Head Boy descend as deeply as possible into the Slytherin dungeon, and then give him a nice climb up all these stairs must have been a Gryffindor.

He scanned the first room. It was sort of like a small common room, except a Christmas fan might have decorated it in green and red with liberal doses of gold. The fireplace was lit, even though it was only September first, and the plethora of candles and lamps were all lit too. Since it was dark, Severus drew the curtains closed. Who knew where he was and who could be looking in.

There were halls and doors. Opposite the way he had entered, was another staircase leading up. Between them was one door, and on the other side were two doors. If he had a bedroom and bathroom, that left too many. Maybe a shortcut to the upper part of the castle? It would be convenient not to have to go down then back up to get to class.

Starting with his left, Severus opened the first door. It was also protected by a password, and his name opened it. His bedroom. The massive size of the bed, along with the yards of green velvet hangings, was ridiculous. The bed was bigger than his whole bedroom at home. His trunk was here, and he let Phi take a look around. There were no windows in here for her. Inconvenient since Severus let her out, closed the window, and would hear her signal to be let back in. It had worked very well at Spinner's End. He could leave the window in the other room cracked open for her, and work on fine-tuning the charm to keep cold air out to cover that area. That was a tricky one because truly air-tight meant other things could not pass, so it was a variation with permeability.

The other doors in here led to an enormous closet and his bath, or perhaps the Loch Ness Monster;s bathtub, judging by the size of it. The silver snake faucets with the snake towel holders were ostentatious. It also gave him a better feel for how typical Slytherins lived. There was rich. There were wealthy. Then there were the nobs so rich that they bathed in a swimming pool and slept in something larger than that caravan, which normal families dwelled in while they vacationed.

There was no other door leading out of here. Sneering Severus noticed that as he contemplated the pampered lives of previous Head Boys who saw all this as normal.

He backtracked to the common room, and found the next door was locked, but the password was not his name. Checking with Phi, she felt they were still alone and she heard nothing behind this door.

His mouth twisted as he looked up the stairs. They turned a short way up, so he decided to explore them after the last door. That door opened into a corridor in the school. He stepped out to look both ways to determine where he was. Severus recognized this portrait guarding the door vaguely, but did not remember it. The two scholars portrayed allowed him to change the password before he left to find out where this was. After a turn in the hall, Severus realized he was on the fourth floor near the library. That was convenient, and also validated his impression that there were a lot of steps between his door in Slytherin and his room.

The library was closed now so he went back to the painting of the two scholars and they admitted him. While he was deciding between trying to gain admittance through the mystery door or see how far the other set of stairs went, the questions were answered for him because Lily came down the stairs.

"What are you doing here?" he asked.

"I'm head girl, silly."

He frowned at her. How was it silly to be surprised that Lily showed up in his room?

"So what have you already discovered without me, Sev?"

"That set of stairs goes to Gryffindor?" he asked.

"Yes."

"My stairs go down to Slytherin, and this door here exits to the fourth floor around the corner from the library. How do your stairs connect to your tower? The library is under the Astronomy tower."

Lily rolled her eyes at him, "Magic."

Magic was not the answer to all questions, he thought in frustration. He would have to figure it out for himself since Lily obviously was not interested. "That door is probably to your room. This one next to my stairs is mine."

"Was your trunk already here?"

"Yes."

Lily gave her name as the password when she found it locked. "Did you already peek in here?"

"No."

"Oooh, Sev … is your room as nice as this?"

Severus looked at Lily's room from the doorway. It was a lot of red and gold and lions. At least the posts holding up the enormous canopy over his bed were not wound with snake carvings. "No, I don't have windows for Phi," he observed. Lily had large windows with a long, cushioned seat in front of them. She didn't need additional seating because there was a small sofa and two chairs gathered around the fireplace.

"Wow, look at this closet."

He took a couple steps in to see that Lily's closet was similar in size to his. The layout was different, but who would need something this big?

"Oh, and my bathroom!"

Severus dutifully went to look at it. It was too much red tile. Her faucets were gold lion heads with open mouths.

"Well?" she asked.

"I prefer your bedroom for the windows, but my lavatory is not as harsh on the eyes."

"Let me see, Sev."

He led her over, and Lily thoroughly looked everything over, including jumping on the bed.

"Why don't Hogwarts' beds have any spring in them? They're all boring."

Severus made a doubtful face. The overhead canopy was so large it had wooden supports in the middle. Why would someone want to bounce their head into one of those?

"You're quiet. What do you have in mind to do first?"

"Do?"

"Yeah, it's just you and me. Did you want to fill your snake tub up, and I'll go get my things?"

All the opulence had numbed Severus to the fact that they were technically alone. Why would Hogwarts intentionally put two seventh year students of the opposite sex together like this? Then he wondered what if he wasn't head boy? Would Lily have started out with only some snogging tonight, or would she have jumped in the bathtub with anyone else that ended up head boy? She liked doing things in bathrooms.

He doubted Shingleton got anywhere last year, but Longbottom … Severus did not know him long enough to know if Oakby was seeing him before seventh year.

"I don't want to stay up too late. We have class tomorrow," he reminded her.

"Alright, I won't keep you in the tub so long you get all pruned up. Did you want to sleep in my room so Phi can use the window?"

Since it had crossed Severus' mind earlier that he could stay in the middle room for Phi, if nowhere else seemed convenient, he replied, "For tonight." This whole situation was unexpected. He could live closely with Lily, as they had at Moonshine's, but Lily was different at school. If MacDonald started hanging about in here, his bedroom had to be established as a sanctuary.

The bath went well enough for Severus with Lily being flirty but not too aggressive so they had a mutually satisfactory bout of lovemaking. However when they laid down on Lily's bed, she wanted more and was very sure how she wanted it. She even told him to stay still while she rocked atop him with her mouth open and her eyes half-closed. Severus could feel her body sort of fluttering around him so he left her alone, or as much as possible since he was beneath her. He jerked when she punched him in the shoulder and said he had been doing a brilliant job till he dozed off. It was too much to wish for that Lily could please herself while he slept, instead of remaining motionless as asked.

Since she did not seem truly angry, he muttered loud enough for her to hear, "What do you expect?" Lily was still firmly on him so he slid his hands up her thighs and raised her nightgown as they traveled up to her chest.

"You don't think I'm getting too fat, do you, Sev?"

Lily said 'too fat'. She knew she was gaining weight. Why bother asking him about it? He did not respond to her question and got rough with sinking his fingers into her breasts, followed by pulling and twisting her nipples as she squirmed and sighed.

While Lily was lost melting away again, he removed one of his hands and got hold of her thigh, rolling over to turn them on their sides, pressing the length of his body against her. Their mouths met and they continued with Severus thrusting despite Lily's earlier advice to stay still.

As Lily's movement got weaker as time went on, Severus finished rolling them over so Lily was on her back, and he got both her legs hooked on his arms, holding her in place so it was her turn to lie still.

Lying beneath Severus, Lily felt boneless. She had overdone things, but how could she not want more of the sight of Severus sliding into her? He had her bottom propped up in just the right position for her to see everything, whenever her eyes weren't forced closed or her head thrown back to look at the lions on the headboard.

Later, her sleep was not deep enough. Lily woke up uncomfortably warm next to Severus, and he was twitching from dreams or whatever caused him to do it during the day. Her mum had asked her not to pester him about it, suggesting anxiety, but she had overheard her telling her father that Severus could have a neurological condition.

She sat up and pulled the covers back. They didn't have this big pile atop them in the caravan. Leaning over Severus, she could see in the dim light of the bedside candle that his eyelids were moving. What could be bothering him? The horrible Marauders were gone, their adoring crowd of little Gryffindors had dwindled and did not bother to take on an older Severus, even in groups, school was going well now that Severus was head boy, and that would aid him in getting the apprenticeship that he had been fretting over for years, besides the work they did for that Moonshine fellow. Was he dreaming about his father? Dumbledore? Slughorn? Potter and Black trying to settle an old grudge because they remained immature and too wealthy to have any common sense? Lupin or other werewolves?

When he flinched, Lily nudged him, "Sev, you're having a bad dream."

"Hmm?" was the reply with his eyelids barely lifting as he turned towards her.

"What's wrong?" She prodded him harder, and asked, "Sev, what's wrong?"

"Nothing."

"Get some sleep then. You got your first day tomorrow."

"Hmm."

Lily lay down next to him, then lifted the covers swiftly to get some cooler air under them. Not satisfied, she sat up and folded down the top layers to their feet. Before she was done with that, Severus had resumed snoring.

Even though she was now comfortably at the right temperature, and Severus instinctively threw an arm over her, Lily was now fully awake. She reviewed the past day in her head. Sev did not seem to mind they did not shag at the Leaky Cauldron. Was he upset over her pushing him to act like a head boy? He did not have to copy anyone. She just didn't want him to stand in a corner frowning and staying quiet. Lily had not seen Mary try to flirt with him. Mary did try to talk to Severus, but he had already been in a dark mood on the train. Did Lily miss someone bothering him on the platform?

AN: Severus warded his doors at the Leaky Cauldron.

AN: The head girl and head boy sharing space was an idea in other fan fics (Draco and Hermione!). I considered that might be another factor to wear down Lily's resistance to Potter so incorporated it here.

AN: The twitch was in the original worst memory after Severus took his DADA OWL.


	47. Chapter 47 Classes Resume and Plots Cont

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 47 Classes Resume and Plots Continue

Severus grumbled something about it taking time for them to find a balance as he left her in the morning to get dressed and whatever else he did. Lily rolled her eyes … yes, school came first. However, she did not want to waste the opportunity to spend her other time with Severus, besides doing her head girl duties and time with Mary.

He was waiting for her in their common room, or at least she thought he was. Severus was writing a letter that he said he could finish later. They left together through the fourth floor door and went down to the Great Hall.

Lily made a face at her schedule. There were no unexpected classes, but Herbology first thing? It was going to be cold soon, and too icy before the sun warmed things. Divination also seemed odd as a first class another morning. That only met once a week, but longer. They had been warned seventh year was intense development of their inner eyes.

Mary was with her in Charms, Defense and Divination. Mary's other classes were Muggle Studies and History. She wished History only met once a week, or first thing in the morning so she could get some extra sleep with Prof. Binns droning on about goblins.

In a way, Lily wished she had Muggle Studies for a good laugh. Mary's summer project was another doozy, and she doubted Mary was alone in her misconceptions.

Today the thee of them were going to Defense together, and Lily looked over Sev's schedule to see he had one Arithmancy class a week, while she had Divination. He also had Ancient Runes twice a week.

Their initial impression of their new Defense teacher was poor. The idea to have a Defense study group appeared to be the only way to learn anything. The elderly witch had a handful of wispy white hair that she was trying to pile atop her head to add about a foot of height. She was a painful sight to behold. Severus' name during attendance was a hint of things to come because she lisped so heavily that Lily barely made out what she was saying. Mary did not help by reminding them that Binns hardly ever called anyone by their real name. However, he had a good memory for their new names. Lily was Everest for five years, while Mary was still Miss MacDougall. In spite of all that, two rolls of parchment were due next class. The new professor knew how to assign homework.

Although Severus thought Lily should direct her attention to the defense study group after this morning, she started talking about the fancy dress party after lunch while they waited for Prof. McGonagall to arrive and start class. He did not want to be a go-between her and MacDonald, and told her, "Perhaps MacDonald wants to feel glamorous. That's why she chose Aphrodite."

"Why can't I be the glamorous one?"

"You aren't a beast a couple nights a month. Can't you let her be the beautiful one for one evening?"

"You think I'm beautiful?"

"I've always liked the way you look. Even when we first met."

"The way you'd just stare at me ..."

"Yes, and I think if we can work out the idea I had … MacDonald would still be the fair-looking one out of the three of us."

"With ..."

"Shh. I thought you said there would be prizes and you planned to win them all or something like that."

"I can't win them all."

"If the goal is to keep our identities hidden, then we need to discuss it privately. With MacDonald. Even if she chooses to strike out on her own or work with others, I don't think she'd reveal us."

"I think she'd prefer her goddess."

"The outfit would be the same. She has a constellation named after her."

"I'll have to ask her."

"If you don't like that idea, we can come up with another one."

"No, I did like it, but Mary's got good ideas too."

He sighed, rather than responding. Her idea to dress him up as an errand boy of the gods because that's the only one that suited did not sound like a good idea to him.

After Transfiguration, Severus went to Ancient Runes. Lily stopped at the library to pick up books for them to use for Defense, and sorted everything in her room. The closet fit her whole trunk unpacked and the trunk itself with plenty of room to spare.

With time left before she expected Severus back, Lily laid out her Transfiguration and Defense books along with parchment, quills and ink in their common room, ready to show him that she could think about school work too. Getting off to a good start was important.

Severus entered from the fourth floor, greeted Lily and took Phi over to the window to let her out.

"How was Runes?"

"Fine. Lots of work to do before next class, but I don't have it again till next week."

"I stopped at the library. We might have everything here to complete our Defense assignment. Transfiguration was only to practice that new spell."

"Yes," Severus agreed, leaning down to look at the books Lily had procured after he let his bag fall onto one of the sofas.

"Do you want to work on that assignment after dinner?"

"Alright."

They began before going to the Great Hall, and when they returned finished in no time.

"Oh, did you see the view of the lake earlier, Sev?" Lily asked as he closed the drapes.

"I did let Phi out this window. Do you think I should leave the curtains open? It's a new entry for her."

"She's smart, Sev." How could she get completely lost? Hogwarts was pretty big and lit up at night, and she knew the clock tower from last year, if she got confused.

"May I go to the library before it closes?"

Lily's brow furrowed. It sounded like Sev was asking permission. "If you need to. I wouldn't stop you."

"I wasn't sure if you had made plans for us."

"Uh, no, I hadn't. Could you take these books back with you? Are you going to work on something?"

"At least get the books. I can work on it later."

"Well, I can go over to Gryffindor and visit Mary, or maybe help some younger students. Are you still going to meet up with those boys from last year?"

"Probably. It's only the first day, and we do see each other at meals. It's alright if Black and Crouch are part of your defense study group?"

"Crouch got us the subjects so that wouldn't be very nice of me to say we wouldn't study with him."

"I could alone, if you don't want to be around other Slytherins."

"Why would I say that? They seem nice."

"Let me get going with these," he said as he picked up the books they used for Defense, "and we can talk more about what you had in mind for the study group later."

In the Gryffindor common room, Lily sat with Mary. They were the only two seventh years so they fielded a range of questions. Not all of them were in good taste, and there were some subjects that the two of them did not take. Arithmancy and Ancient Runes were not popular subjects for Gryffindors, but some did take those classes. When they sounded hesitant to go back to their teachers for extra help, Lily could hardly comprehend the questions to try to remember them for Severus, so asked the ones that were truly stuck on something to write it down. Not sure how Sev would take this, she warned them that the Head Boy had a lot of his own schoolwork and may not have time to get to these.

Mary annoyed her by sort of contradicting her and saying what a great help Severus was at explaining things in a different way that made it more understandable.

It was alright for Sev to help her friend, but Lily thought a couple of these toerags called him Snivellus when it was popular to do so. She wanted to help her fellow Gryffindors, however not all of them were deserving.

Glancing at the clock, Lily said, "It's eight. I'll see what Sev says about these. It might have to wait till the weekend for him even to read them."

"Can I come?" Mary asked.

"Uh, I guess," Lily responded. She was thinking of waiting to ask Severus to take a look at these, if he looked busy. Maybe she could get them talking about the fancy dress party and forget she had these for a day.

After they passed through Lily's head girl door, Mary complained, "How many steps are there?"

"I think our rooms are actually on the fourth floor. We have another door that goes out near the library without any steps. Sev's stairs come up from the dungeon."

"You can go into Slytherin?"

"Why would I want to do that?" Lily innocently inquired. She had not mentioned that she had seen the enemies' common room over the last Christmas holiday.

"To see what it looks like."

"Sev said it was underground with no windows. That's got to be dull."

"Have you ever heard Severus rave about anything? It could be great down there."

"It's probably all snooty with their stuck-up ways. Maybe it's nice when it's empty."

"Their house is traditional. Severus and you are not so it's difficult to … you know …."

Lily's mouth quirked to the side in annoyance as she filled in different 'you know's in her mind about the narrow-minded hypocrites down in the dungeons. Not traditional. She'd give them nontraditional.

Mary sped up when she saw better light at the bottom of the stairs, and exclaimed, "Severus, here you are working on all that while Lily's wasting time with us Gryffindors."

Lily saw Severus visibly cringe at Mary's approach. It appeared that Severus was working diligently. She thought it was his Runes work since his dictionaries were out, and piled in a semicircle around his scattered parchments. "It wasn't like that, Sev," Lily corrected. "Gryffindor's trying to overcome its image of being a bunch of wastrels and want to get serious about their schoolwork, but now they don't understand the basics. The two of us were swamped, but we know nothing about Runes or Arithmancy, the hardest two subjects."

"Why would they expect you to? They should have paid attention before."

Mary sat down on the arm of the chair and leaned towards him, "But Severus, couldn't you help us just a little?"

"They should try working on it themselves, rather than bothering us," he replied, shifting his body to the other side of the chair. His eyes met Lily's. She could not tell if he was looking for help, or he was accusing her of putting him in this awkward position.

"Let's let Sev get to a point where he can take a break, Mary. Did you want to see my room? The closet's huge, and the bath's even bigger than the one that the prefects use."

"Alright. Don't let us bother you, Severus," Mary said and patted him on the shoulder.

It was too late. Severus was already bothered and very annoyed. While they traipsed into to Lily's room, he packed up his things and went to his room. He gave his door a dark glare a short while later because they were knocking on it and calling him.

"What?" he snapped.

"Sev, are you coming back out?"

"Why?"

"I have the questions they wrote down for me. Uh, if you don't want to look at them now, maybe tomorrow?"

Vexed by them, Severus spun in a small circle before deciding he might as well get this over with, or Lily would be pestering him till he did it. Why didn't she just act like she knew what she was talking about? Dunderheaded Gryffindors wouldn't know any better.

When he opened the door, Lily beamed a smile and him saying, "Thanks, Sev." He took the parchments she thrust at him.

MacDonald exclaimed, "Ooh," and brushed by him going into his room.

He looked at Lily. Why would she lure him out to take MacDonald on a tour of his bedroom? With a huff, he took himself back into the common room to see what the idiotic Gryffindors scribbled. He should be surprised it wasn't written in crayon, though one had some sort of drawing on it. It didn't make any sense, even though there were numbers on the sheet, there was no real Arithmancy or even a question written on it.

"What do you think, Sev?"

Lily was looking at him from his doorway.

"Either these are advanced third years, or they might want to consider giving up these classes. A couple are missing the basics."

"Can you help them?"

"I'm not going to do their homework."

"I don't want you to do that, but couldn't you _please_ try for me?" Lily thrust her hip out, put her hand on it and hinted, "I could make it worth your time."

Severus raised an eyebrow. If Lily was offering to recompense him with sex, he already got that from her. Usually one negotiated with something that was currently not given away for free.

He offered her the parchment with the drawing, "Whoever wrote this, I'm not sure if they even know what Arithmancy is."

Lily glanced at it, then snatched it away from Severus. Someone had drawn a round thing with a circle on top, put two smaller round things towards the top center inside the circle and an upside down triangle at the bottom with a wide vertical line outside the circle lined up in the direction of the triangle. Her body was not a circle.

"What?" Severus asked.

She looked back at him. Sev was serious. He did not know that the drawing was supposed to be of her. "Nothing, some toerag. Let me think who gave this to me."

Severus shrugged as Lily crumpled it up and threw it in the fireplace. He didn't know who gave it to her, and if she was just going to take whatever parchments Gryffindor threw at her and deliver them to him, he was lucky that there was not a stack of insults here.

He rose with a sigh, and said, "I can try to get them sorted, or point them in the right direction. I don't know if a couple hours is going to help. If they can't pay the least bit of attention in class, why would they listen to me?"

"Give it a try. I'll come with you, and if they are terrible gits, then we'll take points for wasting your time, and I'll never bother you again for this."

He shuffled through the parchments, then said, "Let me bring a couple of my reference books."

"Now?" Lily asked.

"These are pathetic, and you offered to let me go if this is some prank of theirs."

"It better not be."

Severus stopped in the doorway of his room. MacDonald was sprawled across his bed.

"How do I look, Severus?"

He looked at her more closely than he normally did. She did not appear flushed or pale so he asked, "Are you feeling ill?"

Between Severus' response and Lily appearing beside him with her fists clenched, Mary decided to get up. Lily probably gave him the worst pity shag ever if he had no clue what she meant. Over the summer, it looked like Lily maintained her extra weight from June, but had gained no more. Mary hoped she went back to shoveling it in here at Hogwarts. Severus may be loyal, but if Lily only wanted to be his friend, then he was available. Once Mary showed him some good sex, there'd be no way he'd want a cow like that. Besides, Lily was off to apprentice to a healer. That took up a lot of time so she'd hardly miss him.

After glaring at Mary for a moment, Lily asked, "Did you want me to ask them to come here?"

"I don't want them in here. You've told me enough times how they mess up their own common room. Besides, I don't want to give them an excuse to be out after curfew." He went to the window and called Phi in. She was good at watching out for him.

When he had the books he wanted, he perplexedly asked Lily who was heading to their main door, "Isn't it the same number of steps either way?" as he pointed towards her stairs.

"You can't go that way. The stairs inside Gryffindor don't allow boys on the girl side."

"Why not?"

"Isn't it that way in Slytherin?"

"I only went over there once to get those potions for you."

"What potions?" Mary asked.

"Nothing," Lily answered.

Severus went to their main fourth floor door and went out. The witches followed. "Where we going to do this, Sev?"

"I don't know. Maybe if it looks quick, I can do it on the landing outside your portrait. Longbottom came into our common room, but I don't want food to rain down on my head."

"That was only a couple times," Lily corrected him. There better not be food on the ceiling again.

The Gryffindors were in luck when Lily showed up and looked up to a clean common room ceiling. She found a few of the students from earlier and told them they could get some help now outside on the landing from the head boy.

Meanwhile, Severus had transfigured a large slate board and some chalk. He suggested the arithmancy students work together to get as far as they can while he showed the runes students where to look for assistance with their assigned work.

Runes was simple enough once he explained to the couple students they needed to either use the library or purchase supplemental books such as dictionaries. Since these were ancient languages, either older family members might have copies or second hand books should be available.

The others with their arithmancy were a pain in the rear. They did not read the problem carefully so they ignored essential information leading to an inability to solve anything. These practice problems to teach them skills were crafted to give the necessary data to set up their equations. This would help them identify what was relevant later in their studies, when either given too much or applying arithmancy to real applications.

Severus was in the middle of the fourth year problem, explaining that the two speeds given were essential to finding the solution when Prof. McGonagall came up the stairs to find Severus, Lily, Mary and a handful of Gryffindors around a slate board covering the wall next to the Fat Lady.

Knowing that neither Evans or MacDonald had arithmancy, she wondered if they had bullied Mr. Snape into a study session with Gryffindors. His approach telling the younger students that if given information in a early year problem than it's highly likely that data is used to solve it was sound.

The students greeted her, and she responded while looking at the work on the board. They were being shown the correct method to work the problem. It had been a while since Minerva did any arithmancy, but like transfiguration, there could be a lot of delicate calculations involved.

She awarded Mr. Snape five points, then another five for his assistance with Ancient Runes. Her Gryffindors were not happy with that, but the faint protest quieted as her eyes narrowed. Mr. Snape may help Slytherins with subjects, but that was between them.

Lily expressed her displeasure at her housemates trying to deny Severus points on their way back to their rooms. He could have just as easily received nothing for his trouble, if Prof. McGonagall had not come by. However, she did, and she could award points as she saw fit.

When he could not stand to hear her repeat it again, Severus warned her, "Be careful. They might see you as helping Slytherin get the House Cup."

"House Cup? Since when did Gryffindor care about the House Cup? Besides, neither Mary or myself could help them with those subjects. I know Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs might take them, but I know you are good at them."

"Good at them, but maybe not at explaining them."

"You did fine. I understood what you were telling them … not good enough to start doing it, but I understood if it's a simple problem and you're told all these facts about it, that you should try to use all those numbers. Also to read the problem to see what you are asking to be solved. And the Runes … I don't know why any of them thought they wouldn't need extra books."

"They are in the library so if they do that homework there, they should have little problem."

"What about the arithmancy students?"

"Once they start looking at the problem, they should do better."

"They looked alright to me, but did any hiss any insults or do anything to you?"

"No."

Entering their rooms, Lily asked, "So you'd be inclined to help them again?"

"Maybe, but it has to be on real arithmancy. I'm not teaching them to read."

"So uh … what's next? Were you going to work on something, or should I start our bath?"

"I'm not in the mood for working on things … or anything else. I guess a bath, but then I want to go to sleep."

Lily stopped herself from frowning. She knew Mary and her had upset him earlier. After seeing Mary just jump on his bed, Lily was mad herself. "How about we bathe and sleep in your rooms? If Phi's done for the night." Maybe if Lily slept in the Slytherin room, Severus would not think of Mary in there at all.

"I'll let her back out now and call her in when we go to bed."

Later, after Lily muttered this bed was firmer than hers, Severus heard her sigh and felt her turn over till she was comfortable enough to stay. He felt like telling her that he could sleep here alone, but knew that he did not sleep as well as he did with Lily by his side. She was so annoying. What was wrong with her? Or maybe she had stayed the same, and it was him that changed. Lily said he was moody. Could this be a mood of his? Lily could make him happy. He knew that. Severus knew it the first time he realized what she was as a child. Like him. The little red-haired girl who was like him. He wouldn't have to wait to go to Hogwarts to have his first friend. Except for her bossy, older muggle sister, Lily was everything he could want in a friend. Then they got to Hogwarts, and Lily made a lot more friends.

He stared up into the darkness. That was the answer. Lily made friends. Severus did not make friends. He was the problem. He did not have the luxury Lily did to favor one person over another. He had no others, unless he pretended to be friendly. He couldn't stand the look of MacDonald or the sound of her voice. She had snubbed him for years. She was like Petunia, looking down her nose at him whenever he approached Lily their first five years. MacDonald didn't even need to know his address. It wasn't that he was in Slytherin either because she certainly didn't mind shagging Malcolm Wilkes. It was him. It had always been him. He wasn't sure if his parents had hated him, but he was yelled at by people on the street when he was little. Sometimes they'd throw stuff at him. Here at Hogwarts, students yelled at him, insulted him, physically injured him, jinxed and hexed him.

What was wrong with him? And why was he like this? Severus did not believe he could fix it either. He reviewed insults in his head to analyze what could be changed. Even after he washed with a large bathtub, he was still greasy, grimy and slimy. He was not the only thin person at the school. He did not have a freakishly large nose so there were others who might be comparable, even Dumbledore had a long, crooked one. He was not the boy with the longest hair. Others had dark eyes. Others had black hair. Perhaps all together he was wrong, or he'd be wrong no matter how he tried to disguise it. They'd still see the half-blood weed from Spinner's End that should be stamped out because he never should have been allowed to exist this long.

Why couldn't they all mind their own fucking business? He did not go out of his way to bring attention to himself. That seemed to be their problem. He simply existed and the very sight of them made them react. Like a cockroach was strolling across their dinner plates to swim across the lake of rainbow-sheened, greasy gravy. Severus Snape was repulsive.

He was getting angry and thinking of ways to shove it down their throats. They thought he was repulsive before? No, he take it to new heights … or depths. Repulsive depths. Revel in the repulsive depths and sneer at them as they were forced to acknowledge they saw him, and couldn't avoid him. They would be forced to toady, bow and scrape, like they did with Slughorn, Potter and Black.

Severus rolled out of bed to write his solicitor. He was inspired to have them come crawling to kiss his putrid feet.

When he returned to bed, after adding his new letter to the others he planned to mail tomorrow, he started thinking about who would falsely act like they loved him all along. Like he was saint James fucking Potter himself. Slughorn might be the first in line, but there would be a long line behind him. Like they were grateful dogs, wagging their tails, tongues hanging out and just so eager to please him.

Severus considered that he should start thinking about something else, or he'd never fall asleep. Lily's stairs went to Gryffindor tower, but she believed he could not use them because he was male. That was interesting. Of course, Severus had not considered on the first night that he could use them unnoticed. They all knew there that he did not belong in Gryffindor. Other than looking around, what would he even do in Gryffindor? The Marauders weren't there. They were the only ones he'd want to bother with. Picking on younger students did not appeal to him. Having seen quite a lot of Lily and Mulciber's collection, hiding in the girls' lavatory had no appeal. To infiltrate it as forbidden territory was the only appeal, and he doubted it would be worth the effort. If they had something truly special in there, Lily would have told him by now.

At some point he must have fallen asleep because Severus woke to the sensation of a mouth on his cock. His hand briefly waved in the air to get the time. It was past dawn so Lily had restrained herself for hours. This felt wonderful. He was happy Lily could no longer resist. She didn't even stop doing what she was doing once she realized he was awake.

Lily still could not decide what she liked about the taste. She thought Sev liked this because he was usually faster when she used her mouth. She slid up his body, emerged from under the blanket and asked, "No longer mad at me?"

"Mad?" he asked blearily. Maybe he should act angry every night.

"Mary and I were not very nice to you."

"Hmm."

"So everything's good now?"

"Maybe. You also owe me for tutoring."

"Now?"

"Uh, maybe not now. We have class."

"Business has been slow ..." Lily hinted. "You like that?"

"But I just ..."

"Don't worry," Lily said as she slid back under the covers.

When Severus was finally dressed and ready to go, he looked at his outgoing mail, hesitant to send the one he wrote in the middle of the night. He carried it with him to breakfast. Listening to Slughorn soliciting two sixth years, he decided to send it. Severus would not spend this year listening to constant hints that he could do better from anyone. They'd still treat him like rubbish. He already had a couple ideas suggested as to what he could do for others as head boy.

**************************

Lily's mouth pursed as she read her mother's letter. Severus had been writing her almost every day, and Tunie was not happy about all the owls. She didn't know if she thought it funny, or should be annoyed with Severus. Her mum seemed to enjoy getting his letters.

Severus took his letter and request to Prof. McGonagall. She was deputy headmistress, outranking Slughorn. He did not feel like being insulted or questioned. If Slughorn was really as connected as he claimed, he should already know. If he didn't know, he may find out. If he found out, it might get rather interesting.

When he told Lily he had permission from Prof. McGonagall to miss school Tuesday to handle some legal matter at the Ministry, she was annoyed. Severus did explain that with all the killings by He Who Must Not Be Named and his Death Eaters, even half-bloods were benefiting from the drastic decline in whole families. Lily told him not to get his hopes up. She knew that if his mother had any relatives or money, Mrs. Snape would not have been Mrs. Snape. She certainly wouldn't be. She did agree to take good notes though because Severus was not sure if he'd return by lunch or later.

When the time came, it was simpler at the Ministry to claim inherited property. All they needed was blood, rather than the goblins' method of extensive records. His solicitor had been prepared for anything, but not for a landslide of properties ending up in his client's name, including the Lestrange holdings. For an unimpressive looking young man, he had something more precious than liquid galleons flowing through his veins.

After that, they went only to one house. The main Lestrange dwelling. Severus was curious about his father's killers. He knew the Dark Lord fan club did everything verbally at school so doubted there would be anything, but the same hope regarding some hidden message from his mother also bloomed to find the reason his father was killed by Death Eaters.

The house had an infestation of annoying house elves, but they were his house elves. It took no time at all to find the cause … which led to a number of curious ideas in Severus' mind. First off, why would anyone leave an incriminating letter like this lying about? Bellatrix Black must have been as stupid as her cousin, Sirius. His solicitor was more than willing to be of service and to take it to Gumboil. If there was someone at the Ministry that actually might not destroy it once they saw the Black name, it might be him. Severus would need to think up some revenge, but that was not something to involve his solicitor in. He could deliver the letter, and also take care of the Wigtown tickets that Severus asked him to purchase using Severus' money.

His last errand was simple. Severus had considered it, and based on the cliques he observed among the professors, seemed to be entirely appropriate in case one of his plans in the next year turned into an absolute fiasco. At Gringotts, Severus wrapped the badger cup in cloth and returned to Hogwarts with it.

He went to Prof. Sprout's office before dinner with his tale. Considering the high mortality rate of wizards, he came into some property. He went to look at the house to get an idea of what it was, and found this cup proudly on display. Since it was an old Slytherin family, he suspected it was stolen and Prof. Sprout may know who the rightful owner or their family could be. If it was legitimately his, he would be willing to sell it to someone who would better appreciate it. He also warned her to handle it carefully since he suspected it was cursed.

Returning to his room, Lily gladly shared what went on in Herbology and Potions with him and asked, "So what happened?"

Gloomily he replied, "I think a lot of witches and wizards are dead. I already got a will in place to protect it from passing back to whoever meant to benefit from all those deaths."

"You inherited something?"

"Quite a lot. I'm going to have to find something to do with it."

"What do you mean, Sev?"

"There's poverty, comfort, living well, and then this. These properties may be in worse repair than Spinner's End. It's going to have to wait till the holidays. Then I can look at them and either sell them, have them demolished or give them to some charity."

"But you could have a decent house among them?"

"I already have a house. Don't you understand that these were other people's houses? If Death Eaters killed families in them, I don't think I'd ever want to live there."

Lily was naturally curious, but if Severus was so negative regarding the situation, she'd have to wait to find out more. He did live in the house his mother died in so what was the big deal?

Meanwhile, Prof. Sprout had brought the cup to Prof. Dumbledore regarding the curse. She knew what was rumored about Mr. Snape and the Dark Arts so it was entirely possible he'd recognize a cursed item. This cup seemed similar to a described artifact of Helga Hufflepuff's, but that certainly had not been cursed.

Albus listened to Pomona's explanation regarding the cup. Why would Severus Snape give the cup over to Pomona? He was in Slytherin, and could easily do his own research regarding it. If this was Hufflepuff's cup … oh, who had it? Albus knew someone claimed to have had it, and he meant to get around to popping round to taking a look at it … it was going to be another trip into the pensieve. This could be it. It was years ago, and he vaguely remembered it was at one of those crushes after he defeated Grindelwald that he was introduced to someone … a woman. She may have been flirting with him, but oh … who had it been? At the time, he knew she was a Hufflepuff. He knew lots of Hufflepuffs.

He cast a number of charms to determine things about the cup, then finally touched it. He felt it immediately and snatched his hand back. There was something bad about this cup. Had Severus touched it? Well, he must have to warn Pomona about touching it. This cup … Severus had touched it, then gave it away. Well, not given it away, but turned it over to someone who may know who it really belonged to. Very puzzling. Both Severus and what had happened to this cup. Was it a facsimile of Hufflepuff's cup to lure an innocent person into touching it? Why would someone from Hufflepuff listen to it, or even care to do as it asked … power. It promised power. Severus really was a strange boy. A strange Slytherin boy who did not care if an object offered him power. He may have enough sense to realize that if he strolled around carrying a cup with badgers upon it, that people would think it odd. But he came to this decision rather quickly to give it to Pomona. Pomona said he had missed class with Minerva's permission today to handle a matter, and then he returns with this cup.

Albus scratched his nose, thinking. He admitted to Pomona that there was something wrong with it, and asked to keep it for a while to assess what it was. It had some intelligence. Couldn't very well make promises or suggest things without it, but was it a couple phrases to lure in someone unsuspecting, or real intelligence?

Later, on a hunch, he flooed Horace. He had an excellent memory for names and faces. If someone bragged about Hufflepuff's cup thirty years ago, Horace might recall who.

"Horace, do you recall anyone saying they had possession of a cup of Helga Hufflepuff's?"

"Oh … that was a while ago, Albus. Old Hepzipah Smith said she had it, but I never got round to seeing for myself. She died back in uh … oh, I think is was '47 or '48. She was pretty sweet on you, old boy."

"Uh … well, I don't know about that, but I believe you are absolutely right. Hepzipah Smith. Do you know what happened, or where the cup could have ended up?"

"Old girl was poisoned by her house elf. I haven't heard anybody bragging 'bout having it since then."

"It might have been stolen. Pomona brought me up a cup that might be it. Seems Severus Snape found it in a house, but he suspected it was stolen since it used to belong to an old Slytherin family."

"Snape just took it?"

"Well, it's his house now from what I understand. Um, which family was that? Might help to trace what happened."

After a moment of silence, Horace replied, "I wouldn't be so sure about that. Remember his mother had no siblings either? The Princes passed back in the 50s, I think, maybe even the 40s. He's not due to inherit anything. Probably nicked it over the summer while visiting someone else's house and got scared someone would realize it was him."

Albus' mouth twisted. Stolen? But why would a Slytherin family have this? That might be why things were quiet. Someone steals it from Smith years ago, then Snape took it … and then gives it to Pomona? Trying to think like a Slytherin made Albus' head hurt. Though it could be someone that Severus did not like, and this was his way of getting even? But he missed school today.

"Alright, I'll have to look into that, Horace."

"I'd wager that's what it was."

Albus was not as confident as Horace. He had felt something familiar about that cup. He did not know what, but now that Horace mentioned it, he did recall Hepzibah Smith was accidentally poisoned by her house elf. Oh, he had a memory here somewhere … Tom Riddle. It was part of tracking down what Tom Riddle had done after he graduated.

After hours of using his pensieve and discussing the possibilities with his fellow headmasters, Albus stared at the cup on his desk. He had suspected … but the horror of such an act was unspeakable. Who would want to live in such a manner? Who was holding this cup for Tom? Would Tom go after Severus to get this back? Who would suspect Severus would take one look at it and decide to get rid of it? That boy's instincts must be incredible. He had to know.

Lily answered the door since Severus was back to working on his arithmancy project.

"Headmaster," she greeted. "What can I do for you?"

"I was wondering if I may come in to speak to Severus, Miss Evans?"

"He's in the middle of something."

"It's quite important. He gave an object to Prof. Sprout, and I have some questions."

"He gave a gift to Prof. Sprout?"

"Well, it's a bit of a story. He thought it was a stolen object and that Prof. Sprout might be able to reunite it with the proper owner. His instincts were spot on, but I'm trying to fill in the steps in between."

Lily thought it a bit odd. She was not entirely sure of Sev's views on stealing. She had never seen him steal anything, but with him being in Slytherin, it was a possibility. If he found something stolen, she guessed that was the right thing to do. Give it to someone who could get it back to the right owner. He hadn't mentioned it to her, but it was probably simpler just to give it to a staff member and be done with it. They did have a lot of schoolwork with the NEWTs, along with their other projects.

"Uh, yeah, he's in his room … let me let him know you're here, even though the door's open, it's arithmancy ..."

Albus followed Lily into the middle room.

Lily's eyes darted around nervously. There was nothing incriminating in here, and her clothes were in her room, and Severus' were in his.

"Sev," she called. "Prof. Dumbledore's here and he has some questions for you."

Lily could tell from the way Severus threw down his quill that he did not want to be bothered with the headmaster, but he got up and came out.

"Headmaster?" he inquired.

"Prof. Sprout brought that cup to me to check for curses. I agree that it was most likely stolen since I knew who claimed to have it years ago. Who's house was it in?"

"Lestrange."

"You were at the Lestrange house?"

"Yes … sir."

Lily's eyes widened. Those were the people that killed Sev's father. No wonder why he had no interest in their things or talking about it.

"That's certainly a strange turn of events," Albus commented.

Severus stonily stared at him. What would the old man concoct next? Call him out as a liar now, or wait to consult with Slughorn to have it taken away or author some work of fiction making Severus the mastermind behind every death that led to his supposed good fortune? Dumbledore certainly needed to rewrite that last bit about his mother. Or was he already planning something regarding that house to break in and liberate that incriminating letter or something else? It must be hard keeping up that facade when at his core Dumbledore was a heartless, glory-seeking bastard. He must realize by now that Severus knew what he really was, and now he had resources. He was no longer a nobody. Well, maybe he still was a nobody, but a filthy rich nobody.

Rather than agreeing, Severus stared at him. Albus was momentarily confused by the blatant hostility in the student's eyes, but then recalled his mother. Even unwell, this windfall would have certainly changed her life. It wasn't that Albus thought Slytherins had no feelings, but it was rare to see such dedication to one person this way. Usually Hufflepuffs … well, no, Albus had loved his mother strongly … and his sister. Even Aberforth had his good points. With trepidation, since he did not want to anger Severus further, Albus asked, "Were there any other unusual items?"

"Surely there are, but I was there only briefly," Severus replied. If Dumbledore knew of the letter, perhaps even wrote it himself in the guise of Black, he wanted him to believe it was still undiscovered. The more likely reason for it not to be found was that it was destroyed. That's what anyone normal would have done. Maybe the Lestranges were such a group of illiterate, unsocial clods that they treasured any correspondence they received.

"Is there anything else you wish to tell me?"

"Wasn't my answer to your question satisfactory?"

"Yes, it was," Albus replied. Why would Tom give this to his follower? He doubted he told the Lestranges it's true purpose. It hardly seemed a safe way to store it. Did he place so little value on it? He bade the head boy and head girl a good night and walked slowly towards the library. He'd take that foul book back to his office and search it for more answers. Tom was normally very careful.

Early the next morning, Albus was starting to wonder if there were multiple horcrux. Even one was horrifying, but two or more? Even Herpo the Foul stopped at only one. How could Tom put so little value on his very soul?

*****************************

James had gotten a small place with two bedrooms close to where the team practiced. He didn't want Remus to get overwhelmed when he needed to go out and leave him alone with the three house elves he borrowed from his parents.

Admittedly, it was the bare minimum. However, it would be a radical improvement over Azkaban.

*****************************

When Severus received a letter from Gumboil, he already had a wild idea in his mind. It was risky. Nothing like Gumboil advised him against. He certainly knew better to go haring off all over Europe chasing Sirius Black. No, he wanted to bring Black here. Where he was not welcome. Where no matter who he married in France, it would not matter.

Lily thought Severus had been brooding, but he surprised her by suggesting he could spare an hour early Saturday evenings for the idiot Gryffindors, his words, that could not understand arithmancy, before he went to the Slytherin dungeons for his weekly general study group.

He also surprised her Saturday morning by casting something on himself then shaking his head, annoying all the heads of the animals so they stood up and hissed in annoyance. Snake hair! "If you want to bring MacDonald back from breakfast, I'll stay here. I don't want to waste any more time working on this, if you two aren't going to be bothered."

"Wow, Sev, that's good. I'll bring you back something to eat too."

When they returned, Severus was annoyed that MacDonald acted like she never heard the medusa idea before. He knew he mentioned it once in her presence.

"If you really want to dress up as a girl monster, Severus … and you want to be a boy, Lily? I guess I could be your love interest."

"Don't you see, Mary? No one will be able to guess who we are. Even if they get the three names, they'll think I'm Andromeda, Sev's Perseus and … you're the third one."

"The monster, you mean?"

"Not that, Mary … just that they're pretty sure that Sev and I are seeing each other so it's likely we're the couple."

"I don't mind playing the monster," Severus commented. "Lily had suggested we could get some statuary into the Great Hall to add to the effect of our costume since this character's mythical power is to turn people to stone."

"You always planned on being the monster?" Mary asked.

"That was not the original concept. Lily wanted to be a hero … which I'm sure is not so incredible. She wanted to be a sword and shield type, and she did not want to settle for any of the females I suggested since they weren't as famous as the men. So to add to her costume's valor or bravery, I suggested we start looking at who male heroes fought. This gender reversal appealed to her since Lily wants only the very best for herself. We're just her accessories."

Mary laughed, then asked, "So you two are going to become a boy and a girl?"

"There's potions and charms, and since we're going to be using heavy glamours and transfigurations, along with most everyone in the room, we can safely not worry about _finite_ unless someone is looking for trouble from the staff." He then added, "You can still dress in a manner similar to Aphrodite. She was your first choice?"

"Yes, she was. That's awfully nice of you to remember."

"You may want to carry some chains with you. That's part of her constellation."

"They don't have to be heavy and ugly, do they?"

"Not at all."

Severus knew he had some work ahead of him, but at least the three of them had moved past the point of discussing what to be. He could also openly brew things in front of Lily, rather than having her constantly question what he was up to. He needed to stew more lacewings since he was about to use up his last remaining supply of polyjuice. Perhaps that would be an easier way for them to switch gender? The potion he had in mind originally mentioned severe cramping in the lower abdomen as the organs formed or disappeared that lasted for close to ten minutes. Polyjuice was painful, but did not last for ten minutes.

Mary and Lily were inspired and got to looking up different glamours. With their upcoming Divination project, that kept them out of Severus' way for hours.

Knowing she was a half-veela from Regulus, he wanted Apolline Delacour no where close to them so needed to do some research. The simplest thing was transfiguring an ornate bouquet, charmed to let him know when it was received, and sent it with a school owl. How far away were the Blacks? If he needed to time things with any accuracy, that was important to know. Regulus said they traveled extensively and lived for a couple weeks at a time wherever they had a whim to stay.

It was the Marauders themselves that gave him the idea to somehow use Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder. They were known for their cleverness and ability to get rare items, and certainly not above repeating their clever tricks. If darkness powder was applauded once, it would be applauded a dozen or a hundred times. Gryffindors were so easily entertained.

Now all he had to do was work on layering charms to protect his object from unintentional use. It was also the difficult version of a portkey. Not timed, but when it was touched. Severus only wanted it touched by one person.

Severus remained the model of civilized decorum on his first visit to the Gryffindor common room for arithmancy tutoring. He touched nothing that was not his, except to sit down on the furniture and lean on the table to write. Between Lily, MacDonald and Phi no one assaulted him, but there were insults. The arithmancy students shouted enough back to quiet them down, and Lily threatened detention.

He spotted a number of innocuous items, but waited till he used the polyjuice to become Lily as she slept and used her staircase to enter Gryffindor tower in the middle of the night. It had to be something truly memorable as belonging here. Something Black would instantly recognize. He settled on one of the ornate fireplace stokers with its lion's head. With Black holding it, it might appear threatening.

*****************************

Prof. McGonagall was pleasantly surprised to receive that large packet of tickets to a Wigtown Wanderers game in October. Her mouth quirked as she read the letter. With Mr. Snape's change of fortune, it seemed his solicitor was laying it on pretty thick. Another Slytherin, no doubt.

At least it was nice that he had listened to Mr. Snape and that her student had even bothered to tell others about Miss Parkin's tragedy with plans for the school to remember her by supporting her favorite quidditch team.

Though it did not escape her notice that this was a home game for the Chudley Cannons. This fellow had bought tickets, but to the cheapest game he could find.

When she announced their good fortune to the club, Miss Evans looked a bit flustered, but Mr. Snape asked, "Can we have a banner contest to go along with our outing, Professor? Perhaps I can owl order something from Quality Quidditch Supplies as a prize. Team robes, perhaps? Is that appropriate?"

"Those better be some extraordinary banners," she replied. "There's more than enough tickets here for you lot."

"Maybe a quidditch outing would garner us more members, or we can send some to other fans we know?"

"Like who?"

"I don't know, but I'm sure Kennilworthy Whisp would know of other Wigtown fans. Can we invite him as our guest, professor? We can send him enough tickets that he could bring whoever he normally attends games with."

Minerva was growing suspicious. Severus was a Slytherin, but what could he gain from this? And Kennilworthy Whisp was the expert on the Wigtown Wanderers, besides the Parkin family itself. Mr. Snape was making complete sense.

After the meeting, Lily hissed at Severus, "Why didn't you warn me that the tickets were bought?"

"I told you. And if they didn't go through Prof. McGonagall, we may not have been allowed to go."

"I don't know, Sev."

"I also mentioned the banner contest. What is it that's bothering you?"

"Involving all these people."

"We're not forcing anyone to do anything they don't want to. If they want to go to the game, they can. If they want to make banners, they can. If they don't want to do either, they can stay here at Hogwarts. The same with that Wasp game of Slughorn's last year. If students wanted to go, they did. Whoever didn't want to go, got left behind."

Severus was annoyed. Lily asked for this to be done. They had discussed it at length, and now she was having misgivings. This was not even something serious. They were inviting people with a liking for a quidditch team to go to a game and make banners, if they wanted to win a prize. Maybe she should stick to talking about fancy dress parties, and she didn't do a very good job of that either. She'd be talking about ideas till the week of the party, then expect him to miraculously know every spell she needed to be transformed into her vision.

Lily was also giving him trouble over the defense study group. His plan met with the approval of their fellow like-minded students, so there was really nothing to discuss.

They initially met at the library to see who was interested than moved their group to the head student's common room for Friday evenings. They had fifth, sixth and seventh years from all four houses, and Severus already asked the kitchen house elves to send up some snacks and drinks for their meeting time. It was nice and not too crowded.

Lily's objection was the division of work. She was worried that if one of their fellow students did a poor job on his topics of research, that the rest of them would be given bad information. There were over a hundred topics that they could be tested on, and Severus felt between all of them, someone knew a little about each one, and probably more. If they split up the topics and then took turns briefing the others than they'd get through it all without the burden being on a couple of people. He certainly did not want to become an expert on all of these to hold the hands of twenty students.

They had months so none of this would be rushed, and as a group they could decide to learn more, or as individuals they could do further reading, if they felt they were weak in an area.

*****************************

Madam Pomfrey certainly trusted the opinions of Minerva McGonagall and Pomona Sprout over that of Horace Slughorn. He had his favorites, and then there was everyone else. Obviously when a boy fell into that everyone else category, it was not beneath a supposedly mature adult to malign a student to make him appear to fit his esteemed opinion.

Severus Snape saved other students from werewolves last year and prevented another student from bleeding to death.

Now as head boy, he supported a movement in memory of poor Helen Parkin who was slain last year, attempted to return stolen property as soon as he recognized it, and was assisting students with their academics at no charge.

He also forgave poor Remus Lupin so he could be released from Azkaban.

Perhaps it was because Severus Snape was not a very good Slytherin that Horace was so clearly prejudiced against him.

*****************************

AN: I was thinking of the triwizard cup portkey that transported whoever touched it, rather than the timed portkeys of the Ministry. Similar spells, but obviously differently activated.

*** POLL - I've added a poll to my profile with some ideas for the next story. It is located at the top of the page. Plenty of time to vote, and it'll give me an idea of which one I should give some thought to, rather than being scatterbrained. I have other ideas, but these are my strong front runners. ***


	48. Chapter 48 Warm Welcomes

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Chapter 48 Warm Welcomes

Lord Voldemort only had one question in response to the information presented to him by the man kneeling at his feet, "Who is Severus Snape?"

**********************

Severus was worried. There was too much going on. He could delay his plans for Black, but if that was not important, what was?

He was able to prepare the poker for Black and hide it from Lily. From what he had read, veelas brought out an irrational jealousy in men. Besides the obvious problem of no man being able to say 'no' to them. Severus did not need her here and pretty pleasing her and Black out of the castle and all the way back to France or Ireland or the Netherlands. They were rather close when the charm let him know that the first bouquet had been delivered.

Composing bad poetry was harder than he thought. His brain refused to think of rhymes so dumb that they belonged on a lavatory wall. This was the best of his dunderheaded attempts so he cast a charm to alter his handwriting to match James Potter's and to add a layer of anonymity to prevent it from revealing who really wrote it. Not that Black should fall for Potter writing this, but it was better than getting poetry in his hand.

_I sent you this poker_

_To use on your husband the joker_

_Then come meet me and stoke my flame_

_I am ten times more than that bloke_

_And you are destined to be my dame_

_Because it will be my name in bed you invoke_

_You may mistakenly think it will be all the same_

_But you'll know it's me because I give more than a good poke_

_You'll feel almost as brilliant as me at a quidditch game_

_When our bodies rub together we will start to smoke_

He also had to add a layer of complexity to charm these transfigured flowers so if they were in Black's hand when he arrived in the Gryffindor common room, they would no longer be flowers. He was trying to arrange for Black to arrive Saturday evening during his tutoring session, but the exact time was up in the air due to the Hufflepuff vs. Gryffindor match this Saturday. Not that he wanted to make his portkey so picky that it had to be touched by Black at an exact moment. That was too risky. All he wanted was Black. No matter what time he showed up in Scotland. The Gryffindors might hide him, but Severus would know when the portkey was activated.

Lily and MacDonald flounced in while he was working on his Runes before the defense group met. He thought he had them sorted on their fancy dress dilemma. He was brewing polyjuice potion for Lily and himself. From there, they'd be transfiguring, charming and layering glamours so thick that there would be nothing the same. Lily could be the test case for his medusa transformation, MacDonald could do herself, and they could try some on him for use on Lily later. They didn't need the polyjuice now since Lily would be Severus and Severus would be Lily. They were already themselves every day. The spells to transform them would be the same after the polyjuice, and they'd have to remember to keep drinking it discretely. They would not be the only older students making use of potions. Even though the fancy dress party was still a little over a month away, it was firing people's imaginations. Including the youngest students who were whispering ideas or being recruited by older students in their houses to help fill in large groups. Severus was aware of King Arthur's court forming in Slytherin since he had been solicited for the part of Mordred. A bastard from an incestuous union … the flattery never ended. He had politely declined and asked Black and Crouch not to let him know anything further since the headmaster had deemed one of the prizes to be based on students' ability to identify their fellow students. Lily was positive she would win that, and was obsessively learning the names of any student she saw. She had a good memory for faces and names, but wanted to know everyone, even the first years.

As their defense group showed up, Severus noted that all of them were wearing Wigtown pins now. The offer of an afternoon off of classes had netted them more fans, even Ravenclaws.

The group was starting off slow with dark creatures. Identification and protection. These had been covered repeatedly by their various instructors so it took little effort or research to rattle off how to realize that a hinkypunk was attempting to lure them to their deaths. They all had a copy of the testing topics and ran down the creatures with no difficulty. There were some glances at MacDonald when they reached werewolf, but everyone knew she was afflicted. It was not her fault and no secret was made of it. MacDonald never wanted to infect, hurt or kill anyone. Not like the last werewolf at Hogwarts.

Afterwards, Severus spent a sleepless night lying next to Lily in the Gryffindor bedroom. He reviewed every detail and tried to think of anything that could go wrong, other than Black never touching the poker. What could Black say? What could he do? How could he try to get away … other than the incriminating plan Severus had in mind if everything went absolutely perfect. It was not going to be perfect. Nothing ever went perfectly. Severus reviewed his alibis and explanations so they sounded natural. Why would Black even accuse him of anything? He was more likely to incriminate himself with accusations. Severus was head boy, and without the marauders at Hogwarts, he sailed through the school without jinxes flying at him from all directions. He hadn't even had a black eye in months. Why would Severus drag Sirius Black to Hogwarts? Severus knew why. Sirius would know why. Would Dumbledore smuggle Black out of the castle and out of the country? If enough people saw Black, that might make it difficult for Dumbledore to explain. Dumbledore was supposedly a great wizard, the only one capable of holding off He Who Must Not Be Named. Surely a seventeen year old Sirius Black was no problem. A lot of people needed to see Black. Then it would be an easy choice. Dumbledore's favorite boy escaping any punishment again while appearing to be a welcome guest at the school versus Dumbledore's reputation.

Lily woke refreshed and resumed casting spells to try out looks for Perseus. She wanted muscular calves with a different body hair pattern. She complained his legs were not the right kind of hairy. They needed to be masculinely shaped and furred without being hirsute. She even added flesh to his feet. Lily had a similar problem with his arms, but had perfected how to sculpt them into heroic proportions. After breakfast, MacDonald joined her in sculpting his face. Every change led to them wanting something else altered. It was simpler to alter Lily's appearance. His version of medusa was so grotesque that it was difficult to see any trace of Lily remaining.

They gave him a break and MacDonald modeled for them. She changed her face into a wide-eyed damsel with her hair now long and blond. Not exactly Greek, but she was beautiful with it piled atop her head and wearing a flowing white toga with a gold belt and sandals, and gold manacles on her wrists and biceps connected by a golden chain draped over her shoulders. Severus gave her a temporary potion to try for her voice. It was his third attempt. This was the right one with her voice gentler, breathless and hinting of innocence. Even when they talked about the upcoming quidditch game later, it sounded like the next words out of her mouth should be 'save me'.

Everything got _finite_'d before they went down for lunch. Severus felt that out of everything, the girls persistence regarding the fancy dress party would have them ready in plenty of time. It was strange what they preferred to think of as important. Prizes for costumes.

Severus got a break from them while eating lunch with the Slytherins. What if this owl was faster? What if they were closer? Black could show up while they were at the quidditch match. Gryffindor would be empty. What if he was further away? He could also arrive in the middle of the night. Either way, Severus could not rush to Gryffindor tower without an explanation. Perhaps he should have taken the time to plan better.

**********************

What the hell did Prongs think he was up to? Sending his wife flowers … TWICE now. And Apolline enjoyed good poetry. His poetry. Her husband's poetry. Not some dame and bloke crap. And a poker from the common room how stupid … huh?

Sirius Black was surprised to find himself standing in front of the fireplace in the Gryffindor common room … at Hogwarts … in Scotland. Had James gone mad?

Severus felt the portkey activate in the middle of showing the dunderheads that they needed to keep both sides of an equation in balance. It was followed immediately by gasps, exclamations, screams and both MacDonald and Lily vowing payback as they took out their wands.

He felt that marriage and the experience of becoming well-traveled did not mature Black, and the silly goatee he grew did nothing to hide his gobsmacked expression. He looked priceless standing there half-naked with the portkey in one hand and a dead badger hanging from the other. Too bad for those assembled here that Hufflepuff won the game today.

Lily had been sitting on the back of the sofa bored to tears because no one was bothering them this week while Severus showed this study group a technique to do some barmy artihmancy thing about balance. Did Sev see their relationship as some arithmancy thing? He had used the word balance.

Mary had taken out a slim volume of radical cosmetic charms for the truly ugly and would occasionally show Lily one. For daily use, these could be charmed onto jewelry with an extra protective charm to keep stray _finite_s from ruining someone publicly.

Blinking, Lily thought she was seeing things. A shirtless Sirius Black was suddenly in the middle of the common room. Was that a dead badger he was swinging around? Some quidditch victory party? Hufflepuff won. And he was expelled, he couldn't just show up whenever he liked. Wait, it was Sirius Black. Lily did not have to track his sneaky, lying, murdering ass down because here he was, and there was little doubt he was here for anything good. This was Lily's moment to shine and capture Sirius Black and make him go to prison for killing Helen.

However, Mary was thinking along similar lines, except she was going to torture Black for turning her into a werewolf. This saved her the trouble of tracking him down after she graduated. Mary certainly had enough money to see Europe in style on that hunt, but if Black wanted to settle accounts now, she'd oblige him.

Some old girlfriend claimed she was going to kill him, but another female voice was vowing, "... slice off his bollocks, skewer them, roast them over the flame and make Black eat them." Oh, it was MacDonald. She always had a thing for him. Well too bad, he was off the market … what the … Snape was sitting in their common room. Not hanging upside down naked because he was caught but sitting his pimpled arse on their furniture … and he … oh no … oh no, he didn't … he had the gall to raise an eyebrow at him and smirk … wait till he got out his wand, he'd teach him a thing about respect.

Severus requested Phi attack the philistine holding the dead badger, and then let the darkness powder drop as he stood, taking out his wand. He carefully moved towards the fireplace, feeling for the heat when he located the mantle. Things did not sound like they were going well for Black in the dark, but he'd see how that turned out soon enough. For now, he had a little something extra in mind as he took out his floo powder and tossed some towards the heat. Severus heard the whoosh and leaned close to the no longer hot flames to articulately announce in a low voice, "Potter."

Both Lily and Mary were annoyed when the sneaky son of a bitch dropped some of that darkness powder that only the marauders seemed to have because they claimed it came all the way from Peru. They were able to follow him though because the moron was yelling for "Prongs!" Figures that Potter would find it hilarious for the two of them to show up at the school they had been expelled from.

As the room brightened, it was clear that Black had run into enough Gryffindors that he was face down on the ground with a half dozen people holding him down while Phi pecked at the back of his head. It was a race between Lily and Mary to smash their feet down on his wand hand and pry it loose.

Severus called Phi off and she returned to him. He had strategically gotten behind the couch he had been sitting on to crouch behind it to use as a shield. Gryffindors were shaking their heads … Slytherins. Though if Black showed up waving dead animals and his wand, Snape would be the most likely target in the room. However, there was no reason for him to believe they'd just sit there, cheering him on while he attacked the head boy. Things may be more boring without the Marauders, but now younger lads could use the loo and bath without any surprises. Their house also had some points in the hourglass. Maybe McGonagall or Dumbledore would throw them a few more for tackling Black.

**********************

Later that evening, Remus was happy they got back home. James liked eating out, having a few drinks, flirting with witches, dancing and all that, and Remus was happy to go along, but after hours of that, he was relieved to get back to someplace safe.

James resumed a topic of discussion from earlier that evening, "Yeah, our next game is sold out, Moony. I think it's due to me. I'm always scoring. I doubt I'm going to be a Cannon much longer so it's good I only rented here. And next summer, it's the World Cup."

"Uh huh," Remus replied. He had gone to every game to cheer on James. Since he was not as intimate as the game as James, he could agree that he did score, but was not sure if he was necessarily better than the rest of the Chudley Cannons. Why couldn't James stay with this team and lead them to victory, rather than going to another one? It was nice and quiet here. Peaceful.

Their domestic tranquility was broken by a pounding on the door.

Rolling his eyes, James commented, "Fans … I'll tell them to take themselves off nicely, Moony."

Remus stood anyway to follow James, he called hesitantly, "Prongs ..." Fans did not come pounding on their door. After dark? This late?

"Death Eaters don't knock, Remus."

Swallowing, Remus took out his wand. Who knew what Death Eaters did? They didn't leave anyone alive to talk about it. Killed everyone and left a Dark Mark above the house.

He overheard James complain, "You again?"

"Yes, James Potter, it's me. How has your evening been so far tonight?"

"Great till you showed up, Gumboil. Now take your goons and shove off."

"I'm afraid you are wanted to answer a couple of questions. Your parents are already down at the Ministry."

"My parents?"

"Hmm mmm. Oh and why don't we bring your werewolf friend along too? Maybe he can _shed_ … some light on a couple things."

"Hey, you can't talk to Remus like that."

"Like what?"

James grumbled while Remus followed along anxiously. Remus knew they hadn't done anything wrong tonight and had witnesses, but it was very disturbing to revisit the Ministry now that he was free.

**********************

Albus Dumbledore was quite upset, and Minerva's pacing was adding to his frayed nerves. If she wasn't in human form, her tail would be whipping violently from side to side. Horace was taking it better, sitting by the fire, having a cup of tea and a bite to eat to soothe his nerves.

This was the first time Tom had so boldly intruded at Hogwarts. This reaffirmed that Tom knew the cup was now in unfriendly hands. Rather than asking for the cup or trying to break into the Lestrange house, he chose the more expedient method of killing the current owner with the hope that one of his followers would be the next to inherit the property. It was a rash move to send Black to Hogwarts, but it also showed Tom's hand that he knew a lot about what on at the school. The school year was barely begun and this odd tutoring arrangement for arithmancy so new, that hardly anyone would think to waylay Severus in the Gryffindor common room … well, except Gryffindors wanting a bit of fun. However, there was no way that Gryffindors would stand by while Sirius Black murdered Severus Snape in cold blood.

The only solution was to let Tom know who had the cup now.

**********************

James Potter swore that if he ever ran into Sirius Black, he would simply have to kill him. There was no other way to solve this problem.

The immensity of the lies left him reeling. James did not send flowers to Mrs. Sirius Black. Not twice, not even once. He never wrote her a poem either. Those were the easy things to deny as absolute rubbish.

He had no idea why the Floo Network Authority showed a record of a floo connection being established between the Gryffindor common room at Hogwarts and his parents' house in Godric's Hollow. None whatsoever. James was living on his own and was out tonight with Remus.

Additionally, he could not answer why Sirius Black was overheard by witnesses to be yelling his nickname of Prongs in the Gryffindor common room earlier tonight.

Then the same old questions started about He Who Must Not Be Named, Death Eaters, and how Sirius and James were connected to them, supported them and aided them. Oh Merlin … couldn't they just read the old transcripts of his last time in here?

Out of the blue, there was a new angle about how James was known to hate Severus Snape. Pulled his wand on him upstairs in licensing, right here at the Ministry. They knew Sirius wanted Snape dead and tipped off his fellow Death Eaters on where to find Snape's family. James was in on it. James wanted him killed off for his master too. Why?

This was too much. James was no Death Eater and it did not make someone a Death Eater to dislike a greasy, no-good, Dark Arts-using oddball like Snape.

Alright, James was not a Death Eater, but he agreed with them and their philosophy? Someone with a muggle father was not legally entitled to anything in the wizarding world? Anything Snape had rightfully belonged to full-blooded wizards and witches who were wrongfully cheated? That's why Black was going to correct that tonight? Kill Snape and everything would be fixed?

James had had enough. These asinine questions were going nowhere. Kill Snape? That again. Besides they weren't thinking clearly, if Sirius broke into his parents house and took the floo to the Gryffindor common room, how was he going to break into the Slytherin dungeon to kill Snape? The Ministry had the dullest investigators in creation. And these knuckleheads supposedly attended Hogwarts.

These insults about the collective intelligence of Magical Law Enforcement earned James an overnight stay in one of the Ministry's miserable cells. They couldn't keep him here. He had a big, sold-out quidditch game coming up.

**********************

Although Lily and MacDonald had been charging around their common room with murder in their eyes earlier, their heroism faded as they discussed how and why Sirius Black had returned to Hogwarts. Severus supposed this was the price he was going to have to pay. It got worse as they talked more about how their lives were in danger, Severus' life was in danger, and then could not ignore the fact that his father had been killed by Death Eaters and it was likely Sirius Black was one too. They neglected the fact that Regulus Black sat here every Friday evening nibbling snacks while studying with them when MacDonald reminded them that every one of the Blacks was a dark wizard. She had probably said the same thing about everyone in Slytherin until she started seeing them as wealthy marriage prospects with house elves.

It was not payment enough that Severus' mouth grew slack-jawed and drool was about to start leaking out after hours of listening to the two witches, Lily suggested MacDonald spend the night. It got better, they should all three stick together for mutual safety. What if Black got his times mixed up and more Death Eaters showed up?

Was this some cosmic way of trying to force him to confess the truth? How long would they continue in this manner? How long would it take for him to scream out that it was him, Severus Snape acting alone, that caused all this? Eh, they could do their worst. He was tough enough to stand hours of this torment.

So it was that the next morning, when Prof. McGonagall knocked on Lily's bedroom door after finding Severus' room empty, that she was carefully questioned before being admitted to find MacDonald, Evans and Snape had holed up together for the night.

Her eyes narrowed and her mouth pursed for any signs of impropriety. However the ladies were still in their clothes from last evening, and Mr. Snape appeared to still have his jumper on as she could see from the arm thrown across his face to block the growing amount of sunlight. Usually it was the Slytherin who was the agitated and jumpy one, but Mr. Snape appeared to sleep just fine with the witches in charge.

"Prof. Dumbledore would like … the three of you to join him for breakfast in his office." Minerva amended the request since Albus had only mentioned Severus.

"When, professor?" Lily asked. She must look a fright after falling asleep in her clothes.

"The headmaster is never lonely so take your time. How about in an hour … if Mr. Snape is awake by then?"

Lily took care of that by pulling the shielding arm and requesting, "Sev, wake up."

He yawned. Severus was quite tired after agonizing over his plan for Black for nights.

"We're having breakfast with Prof. Dumbledore."

Minerva saw the responding sneer. Perhaps she'd join them for breakfast. After hearing about these chummy teas, how could she resist?

**********************

His mother came to see him. Sirius rolled his eyes imaging what she'd have to say about this, well he'd straighten her out. "Mother, I had nothing to do with showing up at Hogwarts. It was either James Potter or Severus Snape that mailed me a portkey."

"A portkey? You expect me to the believe that? Why would you carry around some piece of trash till it activated?"

"No, it wasn't like that. It was a fireplace poker from the Gryffindor common room."

Walburga sniffed, "Mighty convenient for one of them to send you an item found in the common room. Well, I'm not going to beat around the bush, Sirius. I'm tired of having my heart broken. You are on your own, as your father and I told you less than a year ago. We did are absolute best, but you continue to throw that back in my face."

"What? What best? You never did your best."

"See, that's exactly what I meant. Farewell."

"Oi, you can't walk out on me!"

When Walburga Black did just that, Sirius continued yelling through the bars, "See! That's why you are no mother of mine! You are cruel, selfish and only think of yourself!"

With a huff, Sirius sat down. He didn't need her. His parents were worthless.

Further down the hall, James Potter overheard Black yelling. Sirius' mother was acting smart for once, or maybe she had known all along. Well, thanks to Sirius, he did not have the luxury on walking out of here for now so went to the small square of window in his door and shouted through the bars, "Oi! Black! You miserable piece of shit!"

"Prongs?!?"

"Don't you dare call me that! And how dare you drag my parents into your schemes!"

"Both of you shut up!" shouted a guard, but that did nothing to silence the two former friends insulting each other. That's why he cast _silencio _ on the hallway.

**********************

On their walk to the head's office, Severus reminded the ladies of their upcoming banner contest to derail their repetitious talk of Black.

"If Kennilworthy Whisp won't agree to judge the contest, perhaps Prof. McGonagall? That way either of you could fairly win."

"Oh drat! I keep meaning to work on that," Lily muttered. "Do you already have one?"

"I have an idea," Severus replied, "but I have not made it yet."

Mary made a face, and said, "I have all the charms I need, but I lack a really good idea."

"You are good at the pretty charms. Perhaps something with a snitch?" Severus suggested.

"You think I'm good?" Mary asked, batting her eyes at Severus.

"With the glittery things."

Lily moaned aloud. Severus points out Mary's strength as encouragement, and she takes it to mean he fancies her.

At breakfast, Severus had to admit that the older Gryffindors got, the more ridiculous their stories got. The headmaster suspected Black had been tipped off that Severus would be in Gryffindor tower at that time and showed up to kill him on behalf of He Who Must Not Be Named so the property he recently inherited would pass onto someone else. Then he added his plan to let the Dark Lord know that the cup was now in his possession by having his photo taken with the artifact and getting it printed in The Daily Prophet.

Between hunks of ham steak, it appeared both Lily and MacDonald thought all this was wonderful detective work and a brilliant solution. Prof. McGonagall had a small smirk playing over her lips. Severus knew that she knew when she smelled bullshit.

Glancing at the golden cup with badgers, Severus reminded them all, "It is my cup. I brought it to Prof. Sprout to determine if it was stolen. Are you saying it was stolen from you or the school?"

"Stolen? Well, the previous owner was killed for it."

"So how does that make it yours, sir?"

"Mine?"

"Yes, you are going to publicly claim its in your possession. Possession means it's yours?"

"It is an artifact from Helga Hufflepuff so naturally it belongs at Hogwarts."

"The previous owner stole it from Hogwarts?"

"No, that's not important. You are not understanding that people have been killed for this artifact. It's dangerous."

Severus understood perfectly. Albus Dumbledore was stealing it. "And you feel its right to bring dangerous things into the school where parents trust you to put their children's welfare first? Cursed cups, werewolves, convicted murderers? If someone like Black can just drop in to the old common room for a visit, how many others are strolling through the doors? However he got in here, by floo or apparition, that's what you control as headmaster. You've already proved you care little for the safety of students so you want to let He Who Must Not Be Named know you have this cursed cup and that the doors are thrown wide open for any of his other followers that want to pop round to retrieve it for him."

"I didn't ..."

"Well, what did you do? Did you fix however he got in here, or you going to wait till its exploited again because what you really want is a Dark Mark over Gryffindor tower?"

"Let's calm down here, and look at this rationally. I did not arrange for Sirius Black to enter the school."

"However, he's alive and well and willing to tell his mates how it's done, if he didn't already tell them before he proved it possible. And you have done … nothing about it?"

"We're still working out how he got in there."

"So the floo's still open?"

"It only allows communication. No one can pass through it."

"Then you allowed him to apparate? As headmaster, you supposedly are the only one able to grant that permission. Your old favorite says he wants to attend a party in Gryffindor tower, you say 'jolly good' and he pops up there swinging a dead badger for everyone's amusement."

Albus' mouth opened. How did Black get in? The problem was he had a Slytherin that was trying to outmaneuver him verbally. Severus could not have that cup back. He looked at Minerva, but she looked back at him expectantly. She was interested in why the headmaster seemed to not care how Sirius Black got into the school and why he'd claim Hufflepuff's cup was dangerous, people were killed for it, and he wanted to display it at Hogwarts when they had no idea how one of He Who Must Not Be Named's followers got inside. Having the students in the middle of this was not acceptable. The scenario of a Dark Mark over Gryffindor tower was not a wild claim because if Black could get in, she had no doubt that he already bragged about it to his comrades.

Lily was touched that Severus had been paying attention to what Mary and her discussed last night. He had appeared to be ignoring them. Everyone was in danger till they knew how Black got into the school. She added, "Keeping people like Sirius Black out of the school should be the top priority."

"But don't you wonder how he knew when to be there when Severus was there? There's either a Gryffindor or maybe a Slytherin passing information to Voldemort."

"That's interesting," Lily replied, "but it could be the same method was used to visit the school before when the common room was empty to read the bulletin board. I think keeping them locked out is important. I agree with Severus. A cup could be valuable, but there's probably plenty of books in the Restricted Section that are also dangerous. You've already admitted someone's been killed over that cup."

"I think likewise, Albus," Minerva agreed. "I do not want anyone unauthorized entering the school."

Maybe he should have invited Horace to breakfast, was what Albus thought, especially when he saw Mary MacDonald glaring daggers at him. This meal had gone terribly wrong.

**********************

When Severus returned from Slytherin, after having missed his study session last night due to Sirius Black, he suggested one more thing to Lily and her sleuthing buddy. "Regulus Black could have been the target. Sirius was disinherited, and the only other male of this generation is his younger brother."

"How could he get from Gryffindor to Slytherin without being seen?"

"Either he hides out in your common room having a laugh with the old gang until the castle was quiet, or he may have had a way to get up your staircase, enter through your door in Gryffindor, and then it would simply be taking all these stairs down through our quarters, with maybe a stop to take care of me while I slept. He would end up at the bottom of my stairs and be only two doors away from where his brother sleeps."

"His brother?" Lily repeated in disbelief.

"He is a suspect for the murder of his father, so I doubt killing a brother would be a stretch."

Their ability to believe that could also be what happened was astounding. There was no need for evidence, just conjecture. He tuned them out while he worked on his correspondence with the legal books he borrowed from the library. Even the backwards laws of wizards protected property. Crouch had been happy to steer him to the right books.

In his letter to Mrs. Evans, he portrayed Lily and her girlfriend as properly heroic, yet cautious, in last night's adventure and even included a newspaper clipping for her. After all, this was the man responsible for the scarring on Lily, her obsession with eating obscene amounts of food and a suspected increase in her sexual appetites. There were promises from Crouch Sr. that Black would not be released from custody for any reason. This time he would stand trial for his actions. Black certainly had a long list of suspected criminal activity, including an odd one of importing flawed flying carpets that intentionally turned completely over to dump all its passengers during the flight.

After that, he told them that he'd be in his room working on his banner. MacDonald was showing no signs of leaving tonight either.

Helen actually inspired his idea. Parkin's Pincer being executed flawlessly by three chasers in Wigtown red upon a chaser in Chudley orange who appeared to be flying in circles while looking at a hand-held mirror and combing his hair. By a strange twist of fate, Severus portrayed this narcissistic Chudley chaser wearing round spectacles and having an abnormally large handle on his broom so the Nimbus logo could be clearly seen.

The sequence of movement was simple enough in his head, but getting all the individual movements perfect took time, including the miserable tailspin of the falling Chudley chaser at the end. He even added the large words Parkin's Pincer on the bottom to label the maneuver in case some quidditch novice, such as Potter, viewed it.

Since he still overheard the ladies debating Black's motives, he decided to add an annoying snitch buzzing around the oblivious Chudley chaser's head.

**********************

As Dumbledore stated, his smiling visage next to Hufflepuff's cup was on the front page of the newspaper one morning. Of course the mention of an anonymous benefactor of the school donating it was a lie, but Severus was willing to let the slow wheels of the law investigate that.

Unbeknownst to Severus, Dumbledore had destroyed the cup using _fiendfyre_ after the photo was taken. The headmaster had considered the danger to the school against the loss of such a priceless item, and angrily destroyed it, blaming Tom Riddle for its loss.

Later in the week, Severus was further annoyed by Dumbledore and Slughorn grandstanding over his substitute for unicorn lung in The Practical Potioneer. Neither were listed as a contributor in Severus' copy of the periodical which was featured as the issue's spotlighted discovery. Any item that a unicorn needs to live is considered a 'dark item', and the standard explanation given for how it is obtained is that the noble unicorn who feels his end is near willfully approaches the proper maiden to have his body harvested for the good of others. At least, that's what the suppliers in Knockturn Alley respond when questioned.

Considering the importance of the life-saving discovery, both for people and unicorns, Severus got a bit of a write-up following Joe Rue. Who supplied this photo of him? If Severus had been asked, he might have found it funny to supply a picture of Davy Jones that used to be part of Petunia's shrine on her bedroom wall. As far as he knew, Mrs. Evans still had them around somewhere. His CV was woefully short, with only two lines, but it did mention his substitute for augury eyes and referenced last year's issue.

**********************

After MacDonald and Lily showed off their pretty banners, he showed them his. They laughed, but then Lily asked, "You sure it's not too much, Sev?"

"That maneuver was invented by Wigtown. As a fan of the team, I should like seeing it. It's natural for me to portray the opposing chaser in the colors of today's opposing team."

"The glasses? And the hair combing?"

"Potter won't recognize it as him. He's too cunning to fall for a chaser maneuver that's been around for centuries. He was practically born with that Nimbus glued to his ass. A true natural and an asset to England ..."

"Sev, you're going to make us puke."

"I like the idea of a permanent sticking charm between his broom and his ass," Mary giggled.

They lined up with their banners folded with hundreds of other students for the expedition to the Chudley Cannons field to watch the game. Lily gave him a couple mischievous looks, but Severus restricted himself to a cocked eyebrow. This would be fun, but not the way he was feeling over Black.

When they arrived, Severus figured out that Prof. McGonagall also spread their extra tickets to the Ministry for helping with Sirius Black the other night. This really could be Potter's time to shine.

**********************

James had returned home in a seriously bad mood. Remus optimistically pointed out that James would play in today's game, but that was not the point. Why was Sirius Black such a bastard? Yeah, James got it that he was totally fooled by Black's act for years. But you know, it was time for him to move on to bigger and better things for Lord Voldemort. Flooing into Hogwarts for a laugh was not exactly Death Eater caliber on the threat meter.

Eh, he had to get his mind in quidditch mode. Big game today. The Cannons should pay him more for filling the stands like this. They'd be sorry when he got recruited to a better team. And after next summer, and winning the World Cup for England, James would have his pick of teams.

The least the Cannon organization could do was fix up their locker room. It was disgusting.

**********************

There were a lot of people from outside the school that wanted to meet Lily Evans and Mary MacDonald. They claimed to have formed the fan club in memory of Helen Parkin. Severus preferred to hover in the background.

They were interviewed by Barnabas Cuffe and had their photo taken with Kennilworthy Whisp. Whisp was honored to judge the banner contest, and was frankly overwhelmed by the quantity and quality of the banners hung. His heart was ready to leap out of his chest with pride that the students of Hogwarts from every house gathered for such a memorial cause and obviously invested a lot of spirit behind Helen Parkin's team. In fact, he was getting a bit choked up which wasn't easy for this old beater to admit. Beaters did not cry, even if they took one in the face … but this … and the banners. The dark red of his team … the pictures of cleavers … there were even beautiful ones of snitches … and oh, a Parkin's Pincer fan. It might take him the whole game to look at all these.

In the stands, Remus Lupin was surprised that there were a lot of students from Hogwarts, along with maybe most of the staff. Were they here for Prongs? And then it sunk in. The banners, and a lot of them were wearing Wigtown supporter pins. What was going on? This was the Chudley Cannon field, and Remus knew fans of other teams came to support their teams here, but … they did not fill the seats. Why would … James thought … oh no. This was … amazing? Was that the word? The few dozen Cannon fans were vastly outnumbered by the Wigtown Wanderer fans in their own stadium, and from the look of things, it appeared that all of Hogwarts was here to cheer on Wigtown. Why?

From inside their waiting area, James heard the crowds. Much louder than a normal game. Might even be louder than when he was a star player at Hogwarts, winning the cup for Gryffindor. Today he was going to score a lot. As soon as he got his hands on the quaffle he'd personally drive it to the hoops himself. No way he was going to chance losing in front of a crowd this big, here to see the Cannons.

When the Cannons came speeding out of their tunnel to the announcer, James heard some jokers from Wigtown using a _sonorus_ charm to sound like there was a lot of people booing and hissing the Cannons … and why did they let some nutter hang all these banners? Jeez. Someone mental must really like Wigtown. Probably another whiny Parkin.

As James circled to the backfield with his team to allow the visitors room to get briefly introduced, he thought for a moment he recognized some faces.

With a sigh, James hovered, waiting for Wigtown to limp out while running a hand through his hair, then adjusted his gloves and fluffed his hair some more. Really, who cared about who was on the visiting team? He picked absently at a spot on his broom handle before absently scratching where his hair lay on the back of his neck.

Lily thought she was going to pee herself if Potter didn't stop playing with his hair. He was worse now because now he was a _professional _hair messer.

The amount of cheering for the other team momentarily distracted James. This was Chudley stadium? He looked around at most of the fans on their feet clapping and hooting. What was wrong with them? Then when one of the beaters, another freaking Parkin, was announced, the volume increased. It was some old, beat-up wreck of a man. Who cheered for beaters? They didn't even score. This guy probably didn't even score with the witches, much less on the quidditch field.

Ah well, James fly around to wave at Remus. What was wrong with him? It was a nice afternoon. Good flying weather. No reason to sit all hunched up like that … and why were the other Cannon family members and fans that attended every game so lifeless?

Wait a minute, weren't that bunch of boys from Gryffindor? They were a couple years below James. What were they doing at a quidditch game … and that girl, oh what was her name, didn't she go with James to Hogsmeade? There were a lot of Hogwarts students here and there was Prof. McGonagall and … how had James missed Hagrid? What the hell was going on? Did they all come to watch him? Oh, was Evans here? If someone loved to watch him play quidditch, it was definitely Lily Evans.

There was his favorite redhead and James swung closer to wave … and she was wearing blood red. So was MacDonald, and why was Snape here? Ugh. And they were sitting with all these stupid Wigtown banners hanging off the stands around them. Man, were they ugly banners. Did some primary school kids make them? And that's why the Cannons let them hang them?

He flew back to meet up with the team. He passed some of his opponents, and thought they would not be grinning like goons once the game started. In the middle with the referee, James overheard something about Wigtown having a fan club. Who cared if they had a fan club? What did they do, offer students free tickets to cheer for them at away games? And why would Dumbledore allow all these people out of school for the afternoon? If James still went to Hogwarts, he'd be in class right now.

James got in position with the other chasers for the start of the game. It didn't matter how many people were here to cheer Wigtown. The Cannons had James Potter. Soon enough they'd change their tune, and if they were too dumb to pick up on a Cannon cheer, James would accept the old 'go, go Gryffindor'.

He was getting annoyed alternately by Wigtown getting the quaffle, or his fellow Cannon chasers not passing it to him. He was open. They were freaking blind. James chased after his teammate who was streaking across the field to take a shot and miss, but then he passed it to their other Cannon chaser, who was more nearsighted and uncoordinated than the first idiot.

There was a banner behind the goal … 'Wigtown Win for Helen'? What was that about? Smack! James was squarely hit by a bludger in the left shoulder and his broom spun on its axis to the right until he corrected it.

At last, James caught a dropped quaffle by the Cannon keeper. All he had to do was cross the field and score. For him, it would be simple. He openly laughed at a Wigtown chaser who closed in on him from one side. He didn't know who he was dealing with. The fellow was a bit mad because he was laughing too. Oh, James got it now, his girlfriend chaser was jostling from the other side. Well, he wasn't going to let go. James never dropped the quaff … Crash … their third chaser ran into him head on.

His Nimbus, James and the quaffle ended up spiraling downwards towards the ground. James vaguely heard many voices yelling Parkin something … huh? Wasn't Parkin their beater? Perhaps he fouled and James would get to take a penalty shot. He should because the other Cannons were rubbish at penalty shots.

On his way back towards the goal, the Wanderer chasers did that to him two more times. James called a timeout and complained to the referee that they were doing it on purpose.

"Yes, Potter. That is on purpose. As a chaser, you should recognize Parkin's Pincer. If not, there's a pretty good banner over there illustrating how it's done. Let me give you a pro tip, now that I've officiated a few Cannon games now. Pass the quaffle to your other chasers. There's three of you."

"What? Why would I do that? They're rubbish. And you're going to let them keep ganging up on me three on one? That's not fair! What if I get hurt?"

"I will be vigilant for illegal moves, but the opposing chasers are allowed to fly in the same space as you, Potter. This is professional quidditch after all. Not a game in your giant backyard with all the sycophants you pay to be your friends."

"What?" James yelled at the official's back as he flew off. What did he know about James' friends? Remus was the truest friend a guy could want. Man was an idiot. Maybe he should look into getting him sacked. He was in no position to tell him what to do. Pass the quaffle. What a lame ass move. If he actually watched a Cannons game, he'd realize that James was the only chaser capable of scoring.

The Cannons' coach was signaling to him. James flew over. "Pass the quaffle, Potter. They know how you play. Mix it up a bit. And don't go calling timeouts because you feel like you need a bit of a break or a lie down, you lazy git. You missed practice all this week, and then know nothing about the other team's tactics."

"What? I was in jail."

"Not exactly a gold star on your record, eh, Potter? Get out there and pass the quaffle. This is a team. The Chudley Cannons. Not Potter's Panties twisted in a bunch."

Huffing in disgust, James resumed the field. Maybe he should buy a quidditch team. Then he wouldn't have to listen to asinine coaches and could hire good players.

Eventually, James was so battered that the quaffle was ripped from his fingers. To add insult to injury it was their female chaser with her bony claws that pried it loose. Then she passed it to her laughing boyfriend and he scored. Then their other chaser. Then her.

James could have stopped them, but the tail twigs of his Nimbus were all mangled from that bunch of flying baboons and the bludgers that kept zooming by him.

By the time the snitch was found, the Cannons were soundly defeated 510 to 40. It didn't even take that long, the game only lasted under three hours. Wigtown cheated, and paid off that referee. No team scored that many points against another professional team so quickly. Potter petulantly thought as he moved to the sides to let the Wanderers form up for their victory lap around the Cannons' field.

There was that stupid Parkin's Pincer banner. Hey! Was that supposed to be him? What kind of rubbish was that? James pulled out his wand and cast _incendio _at it. He laughed, the banners on either side of it caught on fire too. Take that, stupid Wigtown fans. That's what you get for disrespecting the Cannons at their own field.

What? There was a flash of red light shot at him. Prof. McGonagall was in the middle of a bunch of students yelling at them. He remembered that well enough, someone was in trouble. Heh heh. Evans? Maybe not Evans, even though she was waving her wand still and talking. Snape was … not smirking, but openly laughing. Maybe it was Gryffindors in trouble. While MacDonald was waving her fist in James' direction. Oh yeah, he was shaking in his boots he thought sarcastically as he headed to the locker room to take a shower and get out of this crap hole.

**********************

Remus had tried to say something to James yesterday evening about his behavior at the game, but this morning's Prophet … emphatically put things in perspective. Normally, Remus would stick around to support his friend and listen to what he said, but this … well, this was going to be a monumental rant. He briefly considered either tossing the paper out or altering the front page, the second page and the sports section. Remus was not sure he could make up that much false news, and Prongs would wonder where the paper was.

There was only one thing to do. Remus rolled the paper back up, charming it to look unread, placed it on the table, then scribbled a note 'went to market', before leaving the house. He'd come back with a loaf of bread close to lunch and take a good listen to see if it was safe to go inside.

James meandered into the kitchen, while scratching his head and attempting to make sure that his hair was not lying flat. "Remus?" he called when he found himself alone. He grunted as he read the note. Remus was such a good little house witch. His charmed self-warming plate and mug were already on the table with a glass of refreshing pumpkin juice waiting for him, along with the paper.

James sat, yawned, fixed his hair, scratched various body parts, then fixed his hair again before starting on the full breakfast that the house elves knew he preferred. One poached egg, one soft-boiled egg, two kippers, one banger, two tablespoons of cubed potatoes fried in bacon grease and two slices of buttered toast with a light smear of marmalade on one, and a sprinkling of powdered sugar and cinnamon on the second.

Feeling adventurous, James called, "Oi! I want one pancake this morning too!"

"Yes, sir, Master James," replied a house elf. "I's make that for you rights away, Master James."

"And don't forget the syrup. I want boysenberry."

"Yes, Master James. Excellent choices, Master James."

James rolled his eyes. He didn't need a house elf telling him he knew how to pick syrup. Stupid creatures would be dead if they were left to their own simple devices. The little nitwits were lucky wizards took them in an gave them something meaningful to do.

With a sigh, he unrolled the newspaper. What was those jackasses at the Ministry doing now? Besides dragging innocent wizards in and locking them up for four days without any reason whatsoever. Oafs saw dark wizards and Death Eaters everywhere, that's why they couldn't catch any real ones.

His lip lifted in confusion as he looked at the front page. Evans and MacDonald … who was that old guy with them? Reading the caption, James had no idea who Kennilworthy Whisp was supposed to be. There was ',author' after his name. Wait a minute, this was about those two forming a Wigtown Wanderer fan club at Hogwarts in memory of their friend, Helen Parkin. Why did they waste their time on that? Parkin could barely play quidditch. She talked. She never shut up about quidditch, but she certainly was not articulate or charismatic enough to sway anyone to become a Wigtown Wanderer fan. She barely got people liking the Gryffindor team. Parkin was lucky that one fourth of the school was sorted into Gryffindor or she'd have no one cheering for her. Not like James. The whole school recognized his talent.

James' lips moved as he carefully read further. So there's a fan club with Evans and MacDonald. Big deal. … kind benefactor? James' eyes squinted behind his glasses and upper lip lifted from his teeth, wrinkling his nose as he read the absolute rubbish … a solicitor donated game tickets to the fan club based on Severus Snape's enthusiasm for the students' project? He exhaled in disgust reading the drivel about giving back and he was happy to help young people who had direction. Yeah, well, obviously whoever he was trying to lure in as a client never met Severus Snape. The only thing someone should give him is a sound thrashing because his only direction was to become a Death Eater. That's who the Ministry should have locked up for the week.

A sneer crept onto his face as he read the tripe about Helen Parkin. Yeah, she was dead. Merlin's beard, they should get over it already. Wait a minute, they had Remus' name in here, along with Black's, and … his? What the hell? He was not a fellow conspirator. His solicitor would demand they print an apology. James had no idea that Parkin was in danger. It was Snape that was going to be a bonehead and fall for Black's murderous plan. Not Parkin.

Oh crap, what if Remus read this? James stood up and looked out the window in the direction of the shops. No sign of him.

One of the house elves popped into the dining room announcing, "Master James' pancake, Master James. With boysenberry syrup, Master James. Would Master James like some powdered sugar sprinkled on Master James' pancake, Master James?"

"Of course. Who'd want a pancake without sugar?"

"Yes, Master James," the creature agreed while adding the condiment. "Master James 'tis absolutely right as always, Master James."

"Shut up already."

"Yes, Master James. Crispy will go flatten her lips in the clothes press, Master James."

"Get out," James demanded as he sat down. He'd glance at the quidditch page before getting rid of the paper. He'd just tell Remus he didn't realize he hadn't read it. It wouldn't be the first time he threw out the paper before Moony got to read it.

He had to get off the Cannons. The team sucked. And their illiterate twit of a coach had the nerve to blame him. He was the only one of the team worth something.

What was this nonsense? The headline of the leading quidditch story of the day was "Pouting Potter's Pique"? Yeah, so he set a couple of Wigtown banners on fire. They forgot to mention that were displayed on the Chudley stands. What was this nonsense? He did not target the banners of the founders of the Hogwarts Wigtown Wanderers fan club. Oh … Lily Evans' banner was one of them. He didn't care if he also got MacDonald's. Hers was probably the ugly one since she only had one hand.

And why was his coach giving an interview on it? James knew the Cannons were desperate for press, but setting a couple banners on fire was not news. And what did James missing practice and his performance yesterday ... which definitely was not poor … another person that better get an apology printed … it was not poor and James did an excellent job because the whole Wigtown team was ganging up on him. Anyone who saw James play would know this man was a fool. What? The jackass said he was off the team? How could they kick James off the team? He had a contract. He was the only Chudley Cannon that could play. They better issue a really big apology. Better yet, now all the other teams knew that James was available. Ooooh, better make sure there was a fire going, in case someone was trying to floo with an offer.

**********************

AN: LOL. I had not read carefully that a blind poll is also blocked from viewing by the poll's owner until closed. I could edit it to change that, however I can wait to find out the results and stay focused on this story :^)


	49. Chapter 49 Do I Know You?

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

AN: The dead badger in chapter 48 was the alternate form that the flowers transfigured into if they were returned to Hogwarts. A paranoid person would not want any evidence supporting Black's crazy stories about flowers and poetry. The Wizengamot is not known for its wisdom and *** **could * reach the conclusion that Sirius Black was entirely justified in showing up at Hogwarts because someone was sending his wife gifts. Severus chose a dead badger due to the quidditch game against Hufflepuff and what he thought Black would think was funny. Severus dispelled it with a _finite_ when it was lost in the scuffle. However, it was memorable to witnesses.

**Chapter 49 Do I Know You?**

Lily was getting miffed. Girls kept annoying Severus about the fancy dress party. Thinking to score a date with the head boy to get him to cast spells for them? They were so stupid.

Mary was staying with Lily. Until someone at Hogwarts came up with something believable about how Sirius Black got in, than everyone was locking their doors, and at least piling the heaviest piece of furniture they could move in front of it. Sev even thought of how to transfigure stone blocks in their stairwells and in front of doors that were removable with passwords. They were similar to the safe corridor used in the dungeons for Mary when she transformed each month.

The situation with the whole school, except for Dumbledore apparently, concerned about how Sirius Black got in gave Severus a brief guilty misgiving, but overall he was amused over all the conjecture. Perhaps they should be more concerned about He Who Must Not Be Named. Severus had never thought the school was impenetrable, nor did he believe since Dumbledore was here that the Dark Lord was too cowardly to ever enter Scotland. With the Prophet's inability to report the truth, that did not mean the murderous dark wizard was on holiday. However, the newspaper did at least print an editorial about Sirius Black being a murderous thug who should be shown no leniency. He supplied a short piece to Lovegood regarding his views, and a brief rundown of the facts from either Regulus or that Severus would admit to publicly. Black was the perfect example of how the failing justice system allowed further crimes to be committed by individuals that were released solely due to their social standing.

Severus was getting used to MacDonald being around. In a way, he was happier about Lily not taking the closeness between them for granted. It was difficult to say how much he liked it because they were no longer sleeping side-by-side which he enjoyed. They were not shagging all over their rooms, but it was still happening when they suddenly found themselves alone and able to lock a door.

Mary really did believe that Death Eaters could enter the school. Perhaps they'd wait till the full moon and simply send werewolves to Hogwarts to attack the students, or Black, Potter and Lupin would find it amusing to break into the dungeons and set her loose on the school and break off from their friends to go on their own excursion to find her. Would Black escape this time? What had he been planning? Death Eaters were supposed to wear masks and robes, but perhaps in his overwhelming conceit, Black wanted to make an appearance in all his virile glory. What was he supposed to do? Did he expect Gryffindors to aid him? Did he come for Severus, his brother or Gryffindors? Or just a random killing and cast the Dark Mark? Mary suspected she knew how Black meant to get away. That dead animal, which looked like a badger, was a portkey. Everyone remembered seeing it, but it was not found in their common room when they looked for it. It would have taken Black right back to his wife, who'd supply the alibi that he never left her side. Thanks to their preparations for the fancy dress party, Mary knew exactly what polyjuice potion was. They'd come to the conclusion that someone polyjuiced into Black, got into Hogwarts, killed whoever, cast the Dark Mark and then disappeared.

In addition to Black's conceit, Dumbledore was showing off his again. He had not learned anything about student safety from secretly harboring a werewolf in a school full of curious students, or where a nearby village could hear him carrying on all night during the full moon. Why didn't he care that Black got into the school? Why would he think Black would be the last one? Was Severus right that Dumbledore was unconcerned because he arranged to let Black in?

Then to shut up Severus who's on to his oddly nonchalant behavior regarding a follower of He Who Must Not Be Names boldly showing off how he can enter Hogwarts, Dumbledore steals Severus' hufflepuff cup because Severus wanted to undo the evil the Lestranges perpetrated. It was no longer a secret who inherited the Lestrange estate. If the family of the prior owner knew the Lestranges stole it, they could write Severus to ask for it. Though if the Lestranges had it a long time with no one bothering them for it, than they stole it in secret and the rightful owners would have no idea that it was taken by the Lestranges. Who would kill for that cup now that the Lestranges were dead? Severus had not put a photo of it in the newspaper, he had been discreet by asking Prof. Sprout about it. Mary felt that was smart. If it did belong to a Hufflepuff family for generations, asking the current head of Hufflepuff to assist in returning it the rightful owner would keep things quiet. The headmaster could be using it as a candy dish, rather than the valuable heirloom he claimed it to be.

Although Severus was a Slytherin, and could turn nasty when someone like Potter or Black attacked him, Mary thought he was a good person. He was not motivated by saving himself alone, lying, cheating others, and pulling stupid pranks to injure or humiliate others. Severus had saved Mary's life, and showed a great deal of concern keeping her safe if she returned to Hogwarts to finish her education.

Even while being brilliant academically, he was a flickering candle when it came to girls and love. Severus was dedicated to his childhood friend, Lily, even though Lily did not treat him particularly well. The only romance Mary saw was back when Severus showered Lily's bed with flowers for Valentine's Day months ago. Severus deserved better than that, and now that he had wealth of his own, he needn't worry about people thinking he was with Mary for her money.

As the three of them made their way to Hogsmeade on Saturday, Mary suggested, "If you need any help selecting some new clothes, Severus, I'd be happy to help you."

"New clothes?" he asked with a puzzled look. He wore his uniform most of the time at school, and had two pairs of trousers without extensive mending, and now had three jumpers that had never been worn by his father.

"Sev's got clothes," Lily snapped, as Severus questioned the necessity.

"I know you've got clothes, Severus, but I thought you might like spending that Lestrange money on something they wouldn't approve of. I mean it's only clothes, so you'd have plenty gold left. They have a vault down at the bottom of the bank?"

"Bottom?" Severus inquired mildly, acting like he knew little. MacDonald had enough money now that she needn't bother him about his.

"I heard the old families that have always had money have a dragon guarding their vaults."

"That's silly," Lily commented. Dragons guarding vaults. And why was Mary bothering Sev about the Lestrange money? When Sev was ready to spend it, he'd tell Lily. For now, it was still a shock that the people who killed his father were actually related to him. Anyone that bothered Sev about it, either got ignored or the full range of Sev's insulting tongue unleashed upon them. Between that and Sirius Black, Severus wasn't in a the mood to discuss anything but schoolwork.

"I'm not sure of the extent of their wealth," Severus replied. It was close to the truth since he never counted those mountains of galleons that topped out over his head. The Lestranges must have been slobs for generations the way everything was piled and thrown in there.

"Well, whenever you feel like you'd like some new clothes, I'd be more than happy to join you, Severus," Mary reassured him.

Lily was pleased that Severus remained silent. How much money could there be? Could Severus now be as wealthy as Black or Potter? Were there wizards wealthier than those two families? Some of the Slytherins acted like they were incredibly wealthy, but Severus had explained that for some it was only an act. If it was a lot of money, Lily was pleased that Severus did not immediately start acting like those two and … go buy a racing broom. If there was a house, what would Severus do with it? Would he really knock it down? Were there Lestrange family heirlooms that he'd desecrate with his half-blood hands? Put his filthy half-blood bum on their furniture? Perhaps Severus should loosen up a little in Slytherin to figure out who was impressed by wealth alone and who was firmly into that pure-blood nonsense to continue snubbing him. Knowing Severus, he was probably a dozen steps ahead of her thoughts.

********************************

Remus had gone to visit his parents for the afternoon, but could not bring himself to talk about the purpose of his visit. He was still upset by the Wigtown game, but could not talk about it with James. He also could not talk about it with his parents because they were fawning over him and happy that he was not in Azkaban.

True, Remus was happier now then when he was in Azkaban, but somehow he mistakenly believed being forgiven also meant it would be forgotten. Although he had not been involved with the negotiations or even knew how much money was involved, he didn't think those people would say he was forgiven just for money.

Evans and MacDonald always struck him as having high ideals. Neither of them would be bought out. Remus did not know anything about the other Parkins. Rosier and Wilkes were not injured so might have been easy. He also was not so sure about James' appraisal that Snape would sign for any amount of money. If he waived his right to give MacDonald money, that did not sound like he was looking out for his self-interest. Prongs and Padfoot were frequently wrong in their assessment of Severus Snape.

********************************

Now that their physical appearances had been practices and finalized for the fancy dress party, Severus and Lily started on the medusa's victims. The house elves said they would take care of getting the statues into the Great Hall for the party.

Lily had made some generic horrified stone students, but felt her work was lackluster compared to the two seated figures that Severus made. They were … hilarious. And irreverent. A very realistic Prof. Slughorn was solidified in mid-speech with a tea cup in one hand and holding out a triangular hunk of cake with one bite missing in a wide gesture. Lily thought the napkin covering his waistcoast was a nice touch. Prof. Dumbledore was worse with his eyes crossed to examine some piece of candy that he was holding in front of his face with his tongue protruding from his mouth ready to receive it.

Severus stored the statues in his empty closet so no one would see them by accident.

********************************

"Ah, Dumbledore, there's a matter I'd like to discuss with you in my office."

"Barty," Albus replied, "can it wait till the next time I'm in London?"

"No, I'm afraid it cannot."

"Alright, uh, I hope it won't take long I was expected back at Hogwarts."

"I want to verify this is a misunderstanding … the details supplied are troubling, and not at all like you."

"Me?" Albus replied, raising his eyebrows. What was not like him? He doubted someone bothered Barty about him eating vegetables yesterday.

"Yes, we can talk about it," Barty said, closing his door. "Have a seat."

Barty went behind his immaculate desk and opened a drawer, removing a file. From the file, he removed the clear photo that the office had obtained from the newspaper office. "This cup," he said as he slid the photo across the desk for Dumbledore to identify, "the Prophet reported you said it was donated to the school. Who donated it?"

"Uh … well, that's a bit of a problem. Voldemort wants this cup so I thought it best to let him know I had it."

"So you admit it's not yours?"

"Well … if it's Hufflepuff's cup, it belongs at Hogwarts."

"Why would you think that? It was witnessed to be in the possession of Hepzibah Smith before her death, and was included specifically in her will. I believe it to be truly hers since she claimed to be related to Helga Hufflepuff."

"I agree with those facts," Albus said, trying to figure out where Barty was going with this.

"Therefore, it was not stolen from Hogwarts. The person Hepzibah willed it to is now also deceased, without children, but has relatives. Which of those gave you the cup?"

"Uh, well, it did not reach me that way. It had been found ..."

" … by your head boy, Severus Snape?"

"Yes."

"Yes, I have the transaction document from records. He claims you stole it the day he inherited it. Mr. Snape said that he suspected it was not the Lestranges' property and asked Pomona Sprout for assistance. When you spotted it, you claimed it as yours and took possession of it, and then purposely publicized finding it to lend credibility to your claim. Did you confiscate it from this student?"

"Well, as he correctly thought it never belonged to the Lestranges."

"Except that they had it hidden away all these years."

"Yes."

"You claimed it belonged to Hogwarts?"

"Barty, you have to understand Voldemort wants that cup at any cost."

"Why would publicly claiming its at Hogwarts keep it safe, Dumbledore? Didn't Black just get in there and cause havoc?"

"It may have been a one-time incident."

"See here, Dumbledore. That's an awfully cavalier attitude to take towards the safety of the students. In addition, you cannot steal valuable objects from students."

"It's for Severus' safety."

"I find his plan for returning the cup to the Smiths acceptable. They have a secure vault at Gringotts to store it. Mr. Snape also answered my question regarding Slytherin's locket that Hepzibah Smith also included in her will. He says he did not see it, but would dutifully report if a locket is found. He also mentioned he may be interested in purchasing it, rather than returning it to the Smiths."

"A locket?"

"That isn't yours either. You will bring that cup to me."

"Ah... well, that's a bit of a problem, Barty ..." Albus hesitantly started.

"Problem? It will be a problem if it goes to the Wizengamot, Dumbledore. Just give up the cup. You have no claim to it, and you've admitted to me that you took it from a student."

"I thought you did not care for Mr. Snape?"

"That does not equate to me turning a blind eye to whatever crimes you commit, Dumbledore. I refuse to be a party to theft and whatever else you have in mind. Both regarding this cup and the locket, wherever it may be. I think he may be telling the truth that he does not know where the locket is. He was only in that house briefly to take a brief look around. His solicitor was with him, and he also provided a statement regarding that visit," Barty said and verified by looking at the paperwork, "and was asked to bring criminal evidence to this office. That was Snape's purpose to visit that foul cesspit, the cup seems to have been a bonus." Dumbledore must think him an absolute fool to speak against Snape without any concrete evidence now. A seventeen year old potions prodigy that found a simple substitute for unicorn lung and offered it to the public free of charge to save lives?

"Criminal evidence?" Dumbledore repeated.

"Not regarding your theft of the cup, but the plan to murder his father."

"Tom left evidence?"

"Dumbledore, He Who Must Not Be Named is not behind every crime. Additionally, _you _cannot commit crimes by saying it is an attempt to thwart him. I'll expect the cup here tomorrow morning. I'll keep it locked up till the Smiths decide where to safely keep it."

"Uh, Barty, um, as I was trying to say, I cannot do that."

"You can't or you won't?"

"It was cursed so I destroyed it with _fiendfyre_."

Barty Crouch's eyes widened and he sat back in his chair. After a slight shake of his head, he clarified, "It says here … if I may quote you, 'this priceless artifact of Hogwarts' most beloved founder'. You expect me to believe you decided to destroy something you call a priceless artifact, rather than attempt to remove a curse? You, Albus Dumbledore, can't handle a little curse?" Crouch's tone changed to one of utmost seriousness as he tapped his forefinger on his desk imperatively, "You are to produce this cup. No stories about curses. Or how it got lost. Or your phoenix ate it. I want it here tomorrow or you will face the consequences."

"I cannot, Barty. Do your worst."

"Do my worst? Dumbledore, have you lost your mind?"

"On the contrary. I cannot produce an item that I have destroyed so irrevocably."

"You have overstepped your bounds, Dumbledore. I will supply a statement to the Wizengamot with this case indicating that you have admitted your guilt in stealing this item to me, and that you claim that you destroyed it. With it destroyed, you cannot return it and thereby ask for clemency."

"If that's the way it must be, Barty."

Crouch narrowed his eyes. What was Dumbledore's game? He couldn't possibly expect him to believe it was destroyed? Why did he have to be so maddeningly stubborn? "Very well, Dumbledore, if you insist."

********************************

Severus was receiving interesting mail and not just from Xenophilius Lovegood, with an issue of The Quibbler entirely devoted to the Ministry and Wizengamot's travesty of justice. It was not surprising that Magical Law Enforcement and the court had been making grievous decisions since its inception, and the Minister's habit of appointing favorites to the court for any reason but their legal knowledge or wisdom just so they had a place to nap and collect some pay while doing it.

Lily actually read this issue with an open mind, especially with Mary and other girls raving about it.

Barty Crouch Sr's mustache twitched at the sight of the byline 'by Severus Snape'. At least the boy concentrated on the Sirius Black fiasco. His son had mentioned that Black did attack younger boys in the gents' and attacked older girls to rip open their uniforms with Dumbledore's blessing, which led to him moving on to bigger crimes that involved his department, Magical Law Enforcement. Tormenting muggles was brushed aside. Allowed to flee the country after luring fellow unsuspecting students to a known werewolf lair resulting in the death of one witch and the infection of another. It was entirely correct that the Ministry only held Black in custody for hours before releasing him to allow him to leave England and gain asylum in France. Black corresponded with Death Eaters urging them to kill particular muggles on his behalf. Black was suspected of entering England whenever he cared to, since he was the leading suspect in his father's murder because he had been disinherited. The closer for Crouch was the supposition that Black had traveled to Hogwarts to finish the job and murder his younger brother. Barty Jr. slept in that same room. Although Black still denied he even purposely traveled to Hogwarts, Barty would at least expect Dumbledore to say something, warn him, and most importantly take action. However, he decided to meander about with his nonsensical plans to lure He Who Must Not Be Named and his Death Eaters to Hogwarts with no regard for the safety of the students.

In addition to Severus' goading of the Ministry, there was a marriage proposal. He looked at the photo and recognized her as a graduated Ravenclaw. The offer from her parents claimed she enjoyed reading and potions, and she was currently studying in St. Petersburg. Would she call him stupid like Lily did?

His solicitor wrote that his case was now scheduled with the Wizengamot. He had received copies of the additional paperwork and included another copy to Severus. Dumbledore claimed he destroyed Hufflepuff's cup, rather than return it. The deposition was taken by Barty Crouch Sr. himself. Was there some loophole to this? Was Dumbledore so foolish to think that Severus actually cared about a cup? No, Severus cared about bringing Dumbledore down. With that in firmly in his mind, he instructed his solicitor to approach the Smith solicitors. If Dumbledore lied, get the cup and push for a steep fine or a prison sentence for lying to Crouch. If he still refused, get financial restitution. Dumbledore said himself that it was a priceless artifact. Place a value on 'priceless', and ask the Smiths for ten percent for Severus because he brought this matter to their attention.

This week also brought an apprenticeship offer, prior to having his NEWT scores. He'd have to look up Potions Master, Damocles Belby, before penning a tentative reply. If Lily insisted on staying in Great Britain, perhaps this would be the only offer he could accept … unless she tore his heart out of his chest and mangled it as she stomped on it. If that was the case, St. Petersburg sounded far away, but it was definitely not someplace he could imagine Lily bumping into him.

********************************

Lord Voldemort's minions had brought him information on this Severus Snape. In a way, it seemed like Dumbledore was placing a flashing arrow above the boy's head. But why? What was Dumbledore up to?

Originally, Severus Snape was no one from no place with nothing. He fought. He was a Slytherin picking fights with Gryffindors, and Snape liked ridiculous odds such as four against his one with students in his own year. He chose the terrible Gryffindors who bullied the school, including Sirius Black. Even when Dumbledore sanctioned the Gryffindors and punished Snape, he continued to rebel, rather than bide his time as a Slytherin was expected to do. Eventually, the Gryffindors became so uncontrollable they were killing other students. Oh dear, what a mess that must have been for Dumbledore. Rather than admitting a Slytherin could be right and his Gryffindors could be bad, Dumbledore set the boy to cleaning lavatories at night. Ugh … add to Snape's detractors that he was unpleasant to look at. However, that move led to this highly entertaining article in Witch Weekly. Not just Dumbledore, but Horace Slughorn. Oh my, Lord Voldemort thought in amusement to himself. Hogwarts was certainly swirling round the bowl with this kind of press. Murders and molestation.

Not happy to escape imprisonment, Sirius Black decided to strike … normally, Lord Voldemort would applaud such a move against troublesome muggles, but Black made the error of giving orders to his Death Eaters. He lost three of his best Death Eaters due to Black. Snape's father was killed, but that was hardly an even exchange, and then the most ironic twist of fate gave Snape access to the Lestranges' wealth. The member of the Magical Law Enforcement community sympathetic to the Dark Lord supplied him with a copy of the letter Black sent to his cousin Bellatrix.

And now, the thing that actually caused Lord Voldemort to laugh aloud was Snape was accusing Dumbledore of stealing Hufflepuff's cup the day he inherited it. The case was going before the Wizengamot. His man in the Ministry had copies of all this too. Dumbledore claimed he destroyed it. Did he realize what it was? Or was he being a stubborn old goat and refusing to part with it?

Severus Snape's OWL scores were good. Not as good as his, but definitely an improvement over the scores of most of his Death Eaters. He also was head boy. Dumbledore probably arranged that to bring further attention to him.

If this boy knew how to do one thing, it was how to make enemies and he had excellent taste. Albus Dumbledore, Horace Slughorn, and the Ministry. Sirius Black was no longer an issue, unless he became the first wizard to break out of Azkaban.

Dumbledore certainly was not thinking of the 'greater good' when he set up this annoying teen as a target. Unicorn lung substitute with … so simple. It worked? Heck, the Dark Lord would fund this prodigy finding the thirteenth use for dragon blood. That ought to stick so squarely in Dumbledore's craw that he'd choke on it.

The nerve of Albus Dumbledore thinking Lord Voldemort was so simple-minded that he'd take care of his enemy's enemy for him. No one outplots the heir of Salazar Slytherin himself!

Hm, he should create another horcrux, in case the cup really was destroyed.

********************************

At last the fancy dress party was here. Severus was relieved since after tonight or tomorrow, it should no longer be a topic of discussion and they could get back to working on schoolwork. Unless Lily went into Christmas mode.

Once Severus saw Perseus the way Lily wanted him, he sneered. His hair was short, medium brown and sticking up and out, and Lily gave him sideburns. The limbs looked nothing like his real ones, and Severus did not have curly chest hair. Lily had transformed his body into some quasi-animal thing. At least she was good at mimicking a self-absorbed idiot as she used the mirrored side of her shield to keep ruffling her hair or his hair. Nah, it was her hair.

At least his transformation of Lily into a bestial display was intentional and agreed upon in advance.

Andromeda was radiant, while helpless. Gryffindors might be breaking character all evening to save her before Perseus.

They had decided beforehand that Perseus and Andromeda would go to the party as a couple with Medusa arriving separately. They even changed the appearance of their wands. In case anyone was paying attention to that. Lily had her supply of polyjuice in a skin, along with a sword, a pouch for whatever notes Lily needed to make to win, a sling and a pouch for the stones to sling.

In addition to the Slytherin court of King Arthur, it looked like at least a dozen other Merlins were attending the party. There were a lot of Godric Gryffindors boasting to each other, Salazar Slytherins steepling their fingers in front of their faces, Rowena Ravenclaws carrying books, and Helga Hufflepuffs carrying various things from the kitchen.

Their statues had made it to the party, and the stone Dumbledore and stone Slughorn were keeping each other company at a fully set table for two. The stone Hagrid that he had produced yesterday was on the other side of the room. Rather than looking horrified like Lily's students, it appeared he was leaning down to get a better look at his curious demise.

He joined Lily and Mary briefly to trade observations. Lily was excited that many of the younger students were in attendance and warned them all not to guess those too early. Since one of the rules of the party was that characters needed to introduce themselves, Severus pointed out that Flora MacDonald was probably Prof. McGonagall. It was difficult to talk with the ridiculous tongue he gave Medusa, but his voice was pitched seductively low by the potion he was using. Lily's was quite the opposite. She had a brash voice that would have fit any of the Godrics.

Severus moved away from the two of them after he saw some other figures taking their own notes. He hardly had to introduce himself as Medusa, but met two Aphrodites. One of the Salazar Slytherins tried to flirt with him which gave him the wicked idea of flirting with some of the male-appearing attendees later when the game got serious.

There were some vague rules they were given about guessing and that there would be some sort of magical tote board for correct and wrong guesses made and received. That board would not appear till later in the evening to give everyone who arrived later a fair chance.

It did not take long to zero in on a suspicious group, and Severus quickly guessed correctly that the ancient bard with mandolin and bright red curly toed shoes who was popping a lemon candy into his mouth was Albus Dumbledore, Jack was Silvanus Kettleburn and his giant friend was Rubeus Hagrid. He suspected the fourth member of their party was Slughorn, but he was not currently eating or talking about anyone in foreign lands, so Severus did not guess him.

In response, Dumbledore deduced, "Miss Medusa is excellent at Transfiguration, and did an excellent job on these charms. I'm going to have to give this some thought."

Severus knew he would since there were a number of fifth year and NEWT level students who may be able to pull this off. It was also possible that Perseus or Andromeda was the one who did most of the work. When he passed them, he found he could not tell them who he guessed correctly. He circumvented that by telling them that the old bard loved his lemon candy, and Jack worked with magical creatures and his giant was really that height. They understood his clues and decided that after those, they might want to stick together so all three could get credit for correct guesses, or spread out the wrong guesses between the three of them.

After circulating and making some educated guesses, including correctly identifying Flora MacDonald as Prof. McGonagall to which she looked at the three of them suspiciously then asked Perseus if he was Severus Snape. She did not guess the ladies based on Perseus telling her she was mistaken. That was interesting. Severus surmised that knowing anyone that did not guess Mary MacDonald might include the real Mary MacDonald in their group, she assumed the group of one male and two females to be the three companions. The male was naturally Severus Snape, and then it would be guessing which of the girls was Andromeda and which was Medusa. They might stand a good shot of placing well in the contest since no one had correctly identified them.

Alas, when the tote board finally appeared, it looked like either people were heavily identified or not identified at all. Those with a lot of incorrect guesses when compared to correct ones were no longer allowed to guess, but could still participate in the contest if no one was identifying them. Everyone was welcome to stay, enjoy the party, and wait till the more sophisticated costumes or groups were asked to do something in character.

Both Severus and Mary started flirting with the men, while Lily offered to rescue any woman in need of it. Severus boldly whispered an inquiry if anything turned to stone at the sight of her into several ears.

The board was divided by house, and it looked like Slytherin was leading with the most unidentified. They were doing alright with guessing, but all four houses appeared equally matched. Severus figured that they would know their acquaintances' mannerisms best.

When the skit or performance portion was announced, that got costumed groups together that none of them realized were a group. Was each group of the four founders from one house, or did they politically ally themselves with an individual from each house?

Severus was worried. Out of the decent costume groups left, there's was the only one with one male and two females. There had been more guesses starting with Perseus, but every one had been incorrect. Not all guessed Severus Snape either. Someone guessed Perseus was Prof. Flitwick. One started with Medusa and guessed Mary MacDonald. Mary studied that individual's costume carefully to pay that twit back later.

They were organizing this part into some sort of showdown. Dumbledore was doing some magic to make sure that everyone who had not been correctly guessed more than two times was present in the performance area.

The assemblage was then presented with an abbreviated list of students. Severus was hopeful the pair of two girls would receive votes as Evans and MacDonald, while the lone males got votes as Severus Snape.

At this stage, everyone still standing was asked to guess on each person left. They would not overhear the guesses of others, and they would have the tote board appear differently to them based on their individual responses.

The founder groups were invited to display their acting skills first. Severus studied them to see if they even displayed something nice about the founder they were portraying. Hufflepuffs waving rolling pins in the air were probably not Hufflepuffs. The pouting Slytherins who claimed everyone hated them before they flounced away never to be seen again were not Slytherins. The Ravenclaws who read while Gryffindor and Slytherin fought besides them were not Ravenclaws. However, the Gryffindor that mooned Slytherin may be a real Gryffindor. It was a gamble, but seeing no true Slytherins, Severus guessed any house but Slytherin and got some correct.

Merlin was more difficult, and the one Merlin stayed with the Knights of the Round Table, and another stayed with a young King Arthur. Severus counted up how many were in the Camelot group and compared it with the number of Slytherins left minus him. It was doubtful any Merlin was Slytherin so he guessed at males from other houses based on magic shown and skill of their disguise.

Young King Arthur gave a hideously toothy grin, so he guessed Lockhart with his Merlin being his unidentified roommate. Both were correct.

He spent the time during the Camelot presentation studying their facial movement and gestures. He picked out Crouch when he stuck his tongue out. Out of the eight of them, Severus got six correct.

There was not a category on the board to tell how many times his name had been used as an incorrect guess. He only knew when someone did not know who he was.

He still had a lot unidentified, but took a lucky guess with Hades and Demeter. He had caught them snogging in the corridor this past week.

Severus also picked up a lot of points among the Gryffindors by guessing they were heroes like Lily.

They had been warned in advance about this presentation, but were prepared. Andromeda went first, screaming in terror about her situation chained to the rock, and then Perseus rushed over, saved her and then got into a major groping session as they celebrated. When they were asked to break it up, Perseus quipped, "I am going to marry her. Don't you dolts read?"

For Perseus and Medusa, it would be easier for Severus to undo his own transfiguration, rather than reversing Lily's so as Perseus made his speech about who he was and how terrible the Medusa was, he backed slowly towards Medusa, using the mirrored side of his shield to find her, then turned it over and put it over his face. Medusa was transfigured into stone, and then returned to her flesh form and took a small bow, while Perseus clasped his hands over his head and shook them back and forth in victory.

A couple people corrected them by mentioning that Medusa's head was cut off by Perseus. Severus did not know a spell to reattach decapitated heads, or at least one that would result in a living subject.

No one guessed him correctly, and he could not overhear how it went for the witches. Dumbledore asked if he was Minerva. Severus felt Prof. McGonagall would have done a more spectacular job than him, and actually felt insulted on her behalf since he did not consider Transfiguration to be one of his strongest subjects.

He looked in the direction of Flora MacDonald and realized that his disguised wand looked just like hers. That was an educated guess … but wrong.

When the presentations were over the true scores were revealed. Two people had guessed Mary MacDonald correctly. Lily and he were still at zero.

The adult staff gathered together to discuss the number of unidentified students.

Dumbledore announced, "Well, we have some students who took this challenge seriously. Let's see I offered a prize to the one who was the last to be 'unmasked' as it were. I think all the students remaining will receive five points each for their house." Severus frowned. He would not have identified any Slytherins if he had known that. In fact, there was a bunch of grumbling now about this rule change. "We also have quite a few students who identified a lot of their classmates. How about one point for their house for everyone they got correct … and so far, it looks like whoever Severus Snape is, he is in the lead at uncovering real identities, so very good Slytherin. Though don't think we're through with the lot of you that are still presenting a mystery to us. Let's see … this needs to be challenging because there's a lot of other students still itching to earn points for their house. Alright how about you all line up here."

Severus purposely sauntered over while Lily marched maniacally in her sandals.

"Hm, there's still over twenty of you. Alright, so we have some thought going into this rather than a free for all, here's what's going to happen. You lot up here don't get to vote. Everyone else, we are going to gradually eliminate this group but if you guess incorrectly, you have no more chances. You only get multiple chances if you are correct. So if you have no clue, you may want to wait. And let's see, who gets to stay in this group? I'll think I'll have to play that by ear for now, so bear with me."

"Who do you think we should try to uncover first … King Arthur?"

The eliminated Lockhart chose Sir Lancelot from the rival King Arthur's court. Severus had not shared with Lily or Mary that the large Camelot group was formed in Slytherin, so Mary was in the dark. However, looking at the remaining Slytherins, it was possible it was Malcolm Wilkes. That might be why Severus got him wrong since he seemed chummy with Guinevere.

One by one, Dumbledore went down the list of remaining students. A couple people raised their hands thinking it was Severus Snape. Mary raised her hand for Wilkes who was the last alphabetically. She squealed her delight at finding she was correct. Since Wilkes had not guessed Andromeda correctly, he was intrigued, especially by the jiggle of the excited Andromeda's bounces. Many others had not guessed on Sir Lancelot at all so were also still in the game.

"Sir Lancelot, would you like to choose our next contestant?"

"Yes, young Perseus there."

"Very well," Dumbledore agreed and went down the list of students for Perseus. None guessed correctly since Mary kept her hands down. About a dozen were eliminated guessing Severus Snape.

"Perseus, is there someone you'd like us to focus on?"

"Merlin."

Merlin and the next few were eliminated before it was Medusa's turn. Again, Mary did not vote, but had picked up a couple points for Gryffindor since guessing Wilkes. Knowing that Perseus was not Severus Snape, he received no votes for Lily, but eliminated a lot of the remaining guessers since they chose the only remaining female student from Hufflepuff. Someone else was dressed as the other gender. Medusa stared at Andromeda, but was not sure she understood.

Medusa chose the remaining Godric Gryffindor.

Three passed this round. Perseus, Medusa and the Venerable Bede. That should make it simple for Mary if they went another time around.

The staff talked among themselves, and Dumbledore said, "Well, I'm going to give each of you twenty points each for surviving that. Now uh …" he stood in front of the Venerable Bede and said, "I'm a huge fan of yours, and it's a pleasure to meet you. You're Severus Snape?"

"No, my name's Bede," was the rough throated reply.

"I meant really," Dumbledore prompted Bede.

"You are incorrect. Please sit down, and let someone else play."

"Miss Evans?" When Bede continued looking into space, Dumbledore repeated, "Are you Miss Evans, Venerable Bede?"

"Do I look like a Miss Evans?"

"I'm not sure."

"Get your glasses fixed. Now begone you lewd rustic. I have weighty matters to think upon."

"Antoinette Summerby?"

"Well spotted, headmaster. Were you just jumping around the list till you were right?"

"So wait, you … so Miss Evans is Perseus and Mr. Snape is Medusa?"

Both of them shared a suffering look with Bede.

Still trying to rationalize the correct answers, Dumbledore asked, "The three of you switched genders?"

"What's beneath a man's robe is his own business," Bede sagely commented.

There was still more party going on, and Andromeda was delighted that Sir Lancelot asked her to dance.

********************************

AN: Silly me, if I scroll way to the bottom of my poll page, I can see how the voting is going. Only two votes separate the first, second and third place choices. Wow.


	50. Chapter 50 Deluded Despots

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

**Chapter 50 Deluded Despots**

Lily was positive that the fancy dress party was a success. Severus could agree on a social level sort of. It seemed like Dumbledore's administration of the contests made it slow down as he commanded everyone's attention. Severus understood rewarding good disguises and the ability to reward those who could penetrate them to figure out who it was, but there was no input from the students. In Lily's ideas, there was some sort of popularity contest. Had she removed that suggestion after she considered that if she paired with him, there would be no chance of winning it? He also earned points for Slytherin. That couldn't have been Lily's plan. She wanted everyone to have fun and encouraged cooperation.

All four of the house hourglasses had more points the next morning. Even though Ravenclaw had not scored the bonus points at the end, they scored points earlier for their shrewder guessing.

Summerby was surrounded by a number of admiring Hufflepuffs at her table. She looked nothing like the Venerable Bede in real life. She was closer to MacDonald's Andromeda, except without the elaborate hairstyle. Severus thought she was in sixth year, since she had no classes with him.

At the Slytherin table, Severus received mixed reviews. His flirting was disgusting, but two admitted that they were fooled by it. They were in agreement that guessing fellow Slytherins correctly hurt them. Dumbledore should have made the rules clear at the beginning, rather than spreading the points about willy-nilly depending on his whims.

Mulciber was crude, and Severus really did not know why he kept being a stupid ass, rather than keeping his mouth shut. He asked if Snape enjoyed being a woman while Evans was on top. Severus sneered at him, rather than replying that Lily usually was on top as a woman so it would make no difference.

Some of the Slytherins were openly friendly to him that had not been before. Gold did that for some people. Others stared at him with narrowed eyes of suspicion or hatred. Didn't they realize that the Lestranges' own idiocy led to his wealth? And if they were waiting for one of their heroes to kill the cheating half-blood, they'd be surprised that he was irresponsible enough to legally ensure the bulk of it was out of the hands of their families altogether. Lily would spend it wildly while they muttered to each other about uppity mudbloods.

**********************

Albus received a letter from Elphias Doge. His old friend was afraid he finally lost his marbles. Why was such a big deal being made about this cup? Albus was not going to tell them about horcrux because that was knowledge no one should know. It was evil. Ripping a soul apart. And Tom, tossing a piece of his soul to one of his followers like it was a trophy? That made Albus suspect there were more, but he would need to find another one to confirm his suspicions. Crouch had mentioned Slytherin's locket. It could be in Lestrange's house. Albus was not going to luck out next time. Severus was not going to let him anywhere near it … but Severus was here. Dumbledore cracked his knuckles. A house that old would be a challenge, but he felt he was up to it.

**********************

At the Friday evening defense group, Crouch suggested they may want to attempt learning some of the bonus point spells for the practical. He suggested the _patronus _charm since that was the only way to fend off dementors. They had heard rumors about dementors, outside of Azkaban, and if anyone knew the truth it would be the son of the head of Magical Law Enforcement.

Severus agreed, but none of them knew how to cast the spell. Crouch offered to look it up, but mentioned he may have to wait till the holidays to get a demonstration to learn if first-hand.

They returned to their regular studies, since one spell alone was not going to score them an Outstanding.

Since the fancy dress party, MacDonald had sat next to Wilkes in the library on weeknights, and now they were sitting together again. Lily was grinning at them like a goon.

Usually the Hogwarts' house elves were discreet in their duties. Severus and Lily had seen them earlier when they brought up food, but they usually waited till called to clean up. Rather than wearing a Hogwarts tea towel, this specimen was wearing a pair of old yellowed y-fronts that was little more than the Y and a waistband. The stretched out waistband was no longer even human-sized so were cinched around its waist with a tasseled cord that might have been liberated from a drape.

"Oh foulest master that reeks of offal from the unnatural union that spit thou forth from the fetid slime, two intruders have been caught at the splendid house that has been offended by your obscene ownership. Kill them for their audacity to sneak and steal from the most … ignoble and squalid house of Snape?"

"What are the other options?"

"No magic can be performed in the trap. We can's let them starve so it will be a natural deaths, spineless one."

"Can Magical Law Enforcement be granted entrance to retrieve them?" Barty asked. Everyone was aware Snape had a large inheritance. Were these fellows thinking of cleaning out the house while Snape was at Hogwarts? It was an interesting idea, but even Barty's house was full of traps for intruders, and they only had one house elf who was more likely to run in fear than help. Winky would be eaten alive by house elves like the Lestranges'. They'd probably dine on Snape too with those disgusting pointy teeth, if he ever gave them a a chance.

The nasty looking house elf sneered in Crouch's direction, then whined, "Magical Law Enforcement? Magical Law Enforcement? They's is not allowed in the most … ignoble and squalid house of Snape, brainless acquaintance of the obscenity that commands my loyalty. Much betters to handle it quietly, or the smelly, sneak thieves will be back tomorrow."

"Fetch Magical Law Enforcement and give them the two intruders. Let them know I'd like to be updated on the actions they take, and you also return to me and let me know what they do."

"Must I's return to your putrid presence, o baseless bastard of Nature?"

"Yes, I command it."

"Very well, your vulgar vileness. It shall be as you command." The house elf disappeared with a barely audible pop.

"Sev, why do you let that house elf speak to you like that?" Lily demanded.

"It's not my choice. Though does he look somewhat smaller and darker than the Hogwarts house elves? The Lestrange elves look different."

Wilkes offered, "If they have not been traded with other houses, they inbreed over generations. Some families try to cultivate distinctive features. That one was on the ugly side."

The disgruntled house elf returned to the former noble and illustrious house of Lestrange and gave orders to its fellows who were pleasuring themselves as they taunted the prisoners trapped in the oubliette below. The Lestranges had been the foremost wizarding family. Now they were forced to serve an abomination.

Below them, Albus paced the confined and mostly dark space. Only the opening overhead provided any light. Nothing he cast worked. Not even transfiguring the floor or walls. They were certainly loud up there. Why were there so many house elves here?

Mundungus Fletcher was huddled miserably on the floor. He did not have Dumbledore's optimism that those elves were dripping water on them. They pissed down the hole intentionally. He should have said 'no' the moment Dumbledore said Lestrange. Dung's greed got the better of him. Sure, he'd help his pal Dumbledore search for jewelry. If it wasn't what Albus needed, it would be his since Mundungus couldn't be expected to work for free. His time and skills were valuable. They were lucky that Albus had not blundered into a lethal trap. His friend had grabbed Mundungus' arm as he fell. He had not realized Albus had done more than trip until he started to really fall, but by then it was too late to apparate to safety.

Eventually the deeper tones of wizard voices could be heard. A voice called, "Who's down there?"

"I'm afraid there's been a misunderstanding, if you could assist us out of here, I'd be more than happy to explain," Albus called up.

"Dumbledore? What are you doing here?"

"Ah, Barty, well … see that's quite a story. Um, Mr. Snape is a naturally curious lad, and I thought I should make sure the house was safe for him before he came here over the holidays."

"Without his permission?"

"He might have gotten the wrong idea."

Mundungus pulled further into the corner as light was shone down onto Dumbledore. Albus could come back for him later. He knew of only one man with the first name of Barty.

"Dumbledore, I am going to have to treat this like it's the wrong idea. You cannot enter houses without permission from the owner. Plain and simple."

"Can't we just forget about all this? It's a bit embarrassing for me."

"You think?" was the sarcastic reply. They sent all available personnel here thinking it was Death Eaters come to loot the house and set it afire to protest that a half-blood inherited it. "Let me see if I can levitate you out. The house elves say the magic ends at the floor here, but maybe with me casting from here, I can get you out. If not, we'll transfigure a rope."

"Much obliged, Barty."

"Who is with you?"

"With me?

"Yes, the elves said they caught two intruders."

"Oh, right. Well, um, Mundungus came with me to help with the locks and for his skills at assessing items that should not be touched."

Mundungus groaned.

A rope was necessary to extract the two of them. Mundungus Fletcher was a natural at climbing it, but Albus had to tie it around himself and get hauled up.

Mundungus Fletcher was instantly recognized, both by sight and smell by some of the Ministry wizards. A professional thief, con man and liar. Here to make the house safe? More like here to clean it out. Their boss' instincts were right in one regard. They planned to empty this house to the bare walls and floors, just that it wasn't the 'bad guys'.

Neither wizard was released on his own recognizance and were invited to the Ministry to answer questions. After Mundungus gave hardly any answers, he was shown to a cell. He lay down with a sigh and wondered how Albus was going to take care of this. Were a smile and a knowing wink enough this time, or would he need to pay gold? He better not expect Mundungus to kick in a share. It was all Albus' fault that he was even there.

Albus did answer questions, but Barty was puzzled by his disregard for common courtesy, laws and the concept that stealing from students was in their best interest. He wanted to keep this person here because he suspected polyjuice. To suggest that Snape would not miss any objects removed since he did not get a chance to see the house in its entirety yet and was used to so little sounded like absolute lunacy. A Death Eater screaming that Snape was a half-blood and unable to comprehend the fine items collected by the Lestranges would have made as much sense.

Why was Dumbledore so confident? Was he expecting the Minister to sail through the door at two in the morning to pardon him? Barty would get Dumbledore out of here by morning, but that trial was going to be moved up. The Ministry could not look like it condoned this as long as he was Head of Magical Law Enforcement.

**********************

Wilkes, Crouch and Regulus Black stayed after the study group ended to hear how things went. Barty had some faith in his father, but at times his hands were tied by the Minister. That wizard was a contemptible buffoon. Depended on how important the thief was. Though it would probably be a couple of arrogant wizards to think they would not be caught, had the ability to sell items that belonged to the Lestranges to their fellow dark arts collectors, and if they were apprehended, felt they were too important to be messed with. Maybe it was James Potter. That was one hell of an arrogant son of a bitch. What a laugh they had when he was kicked off the Cannons. There was so little about Potter that caused them to laugh. He was vindictive and cruel, even without Reg's older brother goading him. He had been caught in the past with Reg when the pack of them were roaming the halls like animals. Sirius tortured Reg, and Potter tortured the other Slytherin … him.

Lily appeared more upset than Severus. She was angrily pacing. She did not like the house elf. She also did not like that someone took advantage of the fact that Severus was at Hogwarts and that horrible house was empty. What would stop people from breaking in if he lived there? Would Magical Law Enforcement do anything? Who would do that? With Sirius Black still locked up, Lily suspected James Potter. Would he bring Remus Lupin with him? What would happen to Lupin if he was caught? Would his lifetime sentence at Azkaban be reinstated? How fast would Potter be out of there, even if Severus wanted him charged with a crime.

Eventually the ill-mannered house elf returned. He gave a nod in Severus' direction and asked, "Even though you are the essence of foulness, perhaps you could acquaint your indecent form with soap, maggot-infested master?"

"Never mind that. What occurred since you spoke to me last?"

"As you asked, ill-suited cowardly one, Magical Law Enforcement was summoned to remove the infiltrators from the most … ignoble and squalid house of Snape."

"Who were they?"

"Albus Dumbledore and Mundungus Fletcher, loathsome lord."

Severus pursed his lips in thought. He did not know who Fletcher was, but Dumbledore was an accomplished liar. A friend of the Minister. The only one who was claimed to be able to stop He Who Must Not Be Named, although he did nothing for years but make claims about what he needed to do to stop the Dark Lord. People and whole families were still murdered, but the public's faith in the overconfident liar remained. So he replies to the accusation of stealing Hufflepuff's cup by breaking into the Lestrange house to find more things to take before Severus had a chance to catalog the inheritance?

The girls were loudly exclaiming the absurdity of Dumbledore breaking into a student's house. The Slytherins exchanged glances. None of them liked Dumbledore, but it was unlikely that stealing Hufflepuff's cup or breaking into an unoccupied house to steal its contents would result in any hindrance to Dumbledore's autocratic methods.

"Were they freed or taken to the Ministry?"

"They were asked to go to the Ministry to answer questions, deficient one."

"Very well. You may go."

To those still hanging around, Severus said, "I'm going to my room. I need some time alone."

"But Sev, that's not going to solve anything," Lily pointed out.

He shrugged and replied, "I know."

Barty suggested, "Maybe there's some letters we can write. I know it sounds insufficient, but this isn't just about one young wizard. Think of it … He Who Must Not Be Named and his imitators who wish to make monetary gains are murdering so many, especially whole families, that there is a major shift in the holders of ancient fortunes. There is also _younger _witches and wizards inheriting. As we see here, you are at Hogwarts, so you cannot be murdered in the former Lestrange house outside Northampton."

"Northampton?" Lily asked. That wasn't a bad place. A lot of muggles lived there.

"The Lestranges were part of the Norman invasion in 1066," Regulus stated. "Bella was happy they had such a long history. You may have noticed the French sound of their name. Uh … they were part of William the Conquerer's magical forces. Part of what he did was disenfranchise the old nobles and installed his supporters all over, especially with castles or fortified homes. The Lestranges had a castle, but it was destroyed … the story was they were processing muggles like flobberworms for parts and skins. It could have gone unnoticed, but they liked to live a certain way so they really got under the skin of Barberus Bragge, who led the Wizards' Council back in …"

"Mid-thirteenth century. Bragge is more popularly known for introducing a Golden Snidget to Cuaditch," Barry recited. "He also had it in for wizards that killed other wizards or large quantities of muggles openly. That made it hard for him to work with muggles, since both societies were integrated then."

"So the castle was leveled by other wizards. I'm not sure if they were entirely behind Bragge, but the chance to unleash destructive spells for fun on a castle is tempting," Regulus continued. "So they were reduced to living in a mere house. Come to think of it, I'm not sure if their house is even nice. Bella didn't have parties there. They came to ones at her parents' house, who are my aunt and uncle, or my grandparents."

Barty redirected the conversation back to his initial idea, "So you are at Hogwarts, and barring lunatics waving dead animals in the Gryffindor common room, considered safe. Along with Regulus. Now if something happened to Reg's mother … you still have a lot of relatives to keep an eye on things for you?"

"Plenty. They're older but they'd protect anything belonging to the Blacks."

"There's probably a handful who are not as fortunate. What if Snape is only the first of many … or the first that we know of, that are being targeted by thieves? There's no other word for it. Thieves. Setting these two free would set a legal precedent. Looters and thieves are not answerable to the laws as they currently stand because of what … Snape's age, Snape's blood status, simple jealousy? If Snape is deemed legally the owner, then there is no defense to support the theft of the contents of that house. If the thieves believe they are entitled to items in the house, there is a legal course to follow."

Lily looked at Crouch. He was sounding like Severus. Government and laws were supposed to protect the citizens who formed the society at large, and all members needed to abide by them. Albus Dumbledore, Sirius Black and James Potter … and He Who Must Not Be Named and his Death Eaters. With everyone else between them. Actually, not between them, but beneath them, if any of them were asked for their opinion.

Severus shook his head, "Dumbledore's a member of the Wizengamot. They're all cronies of his. That cannot be underestimated." No matter what the outcome, the publicity is what mattered. That annoying Rita Skeeter might like this, or she might decide that Dumbledore was a senile old man who was not capable of making decisions.

**********************

Sirius was miserable at Azkaban. He didn't belong here. Once the court thing was over he'd be free. He knew it. He knew he was innocent. So what if he wrote a letter to Bella? Either her or the two maniacs she lived with cast the killing curse. They were dead and that was it.

If Prongs sent him that portkey, he could settle up with him later. It was not a good prank at all.

If it was Snape, they should have him in the next cell till he confessed.

Poor Apolline. She had no idea where he was.

Contrary to what Sirius Black believed, French people did read and did communicate with people in other countries. Even England.

**********************

The female staff were enjoying a quiet breakfast on a Saturday morning when the newspaper was delivered.

Minerva raised an eyebrow in disbelief. What was Albus up to now? He was apprehended breaking into Severus Snape's house last night and was set upon by the former Lestrange house elves as an intruder. She remembered that filthy Mundungus Fletcher. He was brought into the Order by Albus over the summer. Fletcher tried to sell her a sterling goblet that he had produced from under his rags and made disappear just as quickly. Then he pulled up his sleeve and displayed an arm length of watches for sale. The two of them together, with Fletcher having such a checkered past reported in the newspaper, breaking into an orphaned student's property while he was known to be at school. Ah, an article by Miss Rita Skeeter … she was hardly Albus' confidante, but she was able to connect some dots for anyone who was unaware that Albus already had legal troubles with Mr. Snape. Stole Hufflepuff's cup from him the day it was inherited, and was off on a treasure hunt to find more priceless items from that house. Minerva could not believe Albus tried to tell the Ministry that he was at the Lestrange house to investigate it for dangerous objects to protect his student. In the company of a known and convicted thief? A thief with a history of emptying unguarded houses since he had been caught with monogrammed and distinctive items that had been reported stolen. Severus being a half-blood had nothing to do with it, but Skeeter spelled out in a neat package that Death Eaters killed his muggle father, those Death Eaters were killed by muggles, and Severus happened to be their next nearest relative with over a century since the marriage between the Princes and Lestranges occurred. Perhaps there were wizards who felt he was not entitled to anything, and Dumbledore and Fletcher may be only the first two to arrive at the house to liberate items from an undeserving new owner. She even suggested that Dumbledore may have done this in the past with Fletcher, who had been caught selling stolen goods, and then by coincidence, happened to be a member of the same Wizengamot and used his influence to ensure his partner in crime received either a warning or a light sentence.

Pomona Sprout, next to her, was muttering to herself that some mistake must have been made. Albus did not associate with thieves.

Minerva asked, "What about that cup? You had it first?"

"Yes, and Mr. Snape did warn me it could be cursed so I took it to Albus to look at it. He agreed there was something wrong with it. That's the last I saw of it till it's photo was in the paper. I don't know why he claimed it belonged to the school. The Smiths used to own it."

"Albus said it was a plan of his to let You Know Who know where it was. I suppose Albus thought he could have broken into the Lestrange house to claim it."

"Claim it? Why would he be interested in that cup?"

"Albus did not explain why. Do you know where he's keeping it?"

"No idea."

Poppy Pomfrey sat silently as she absorbed everything. Snape again. Even students were entitled to their possessions if they were not an obvious danger to others. They were allowed expensive racing brooms, crate loads of fireworks and sweets, and until recently, an offensive array of pornographic materials. Albus went to a house Snape inherited and was going to investigate it? Since when did he do that? She never heard of him doing that for other students, and with things the way they were going, Snape was not the only boy or girl to suddenly find himself alone in the world and subsequently the owner of everything their family left behind.

Prof. Upsilon could read English and found this turn of events interesting. Had his suggestion regarding Severus' capabilities to Albus driven him to such a desperate act? Albus still had Tom Riddle to deal with. Did Albus mean to get caught? Why would he goad Severus into acting against him so soon? Severus was a complex person. Atlas Abstractus was quite proud of his student's accomplishments with applying arithmancy to potions. From his limited understanding of what unicorn lung could be used for, it was only used for good, as long as it was harvested in an acceptable manner. It was a good thing for both unicorns and wizards. Why turn Severus' thoughts to other matters than helping others?

Albus Dumbledore was sleeping late. He did not get back to Hogwarts until just before dawn. Barty was impossibly thorough with ensuring it was not an impostor using polyjuice.

Horace Slughorn knew how to deal with this. So what if Snape inherited money? He was still a talentless boy who wanted attention. This was not the way to get it. Albus Dumbledore was a busy man with important things to which to attend. If Dumbledore said that there was dangerous things in that house, that should be the end of it.

Severus glanced at the paper. Dumbledore had not been kept by the Ministry. He was important like Sirius Black, back in last November, and could walk out whenever he liked. Skeeter was already sensing some sensational gossip with this story, and was unsheathing her claws. What had Dumbledore done to her? Was it when she was a student or after? She had mentioned Bellatrix Black. Was she Dumbledore's darling a decade ago? Severus could imagine what kind of things she could do to students based on her cousin Sirius' enjoyments.

Mulciber looked like he was trying to think of something to say from the way his eyebrows were tilting down towards this nose, and then come down here to provoke him. Severus stood, but it appeared that Lily and MacDonald were still shoveling in their breakfast. He headed towards them, but veered off to the Hufflepuff table. Severus waited till Summerby looked up at him, and he commented, "I enjoyed your sense of humor last week."

"Thank you. Not many people understood who I was trying to impersonate."

"There's a question as to whether Bede was really a wizard or a learned muggle, since he was around before the founders. He was more discreet than Merlin."

"But we have books that Bede wrote about magic," Summerby replied.

"True, however, ..."

"Snape! Get down to my office now," Prof. Slughorn demanded.

Severus shrugged at Summerby. He guessed she was not a member of the Slug Club either.

Lily elbowed Mary. What did Slughorn want with Severus?

The Slytherin table was showing some interest in what their head of house was up to. Even though there were wealthy families in other houses, they believed they had the most to protect. Was Slughorn supporting Dumbledore's claim that anything in their homes was his for the taking? A number of them got up to follow and listen.

Minerva had stood to see what Horace was up to now. He became irrational whenever there was something involving Severus Snape. Not that Horace needed to involve himself now. Albus had already made his decisions, whatever his real reason. She observed there was a sort of parade. Severus led, followed by Horace, at least a dozen Slytherins of different ages, a couple Hufflepuffs, some older Ravenclaws and of course, Lily Evans and Mary MacDonald. Then seeing that some entertainment was about to occur, others got up to follow. Minerva sat down and poured another cup of tea. Horace was losing his touch.

After pointing Snape into his office after he opened the door, Slughorn turned on the students that were gathering behind him in the hallway, "What do you lot want?"

"We study with the head boy in the library, sir."

"Well he's busy."

"We'll be happy to wait, sir."

"Don't bother. I might be keeping him for a few hours."

Arms were crossed, then some started to take a seat against the wall.

Slughorn shook his head at their futility. Snape was an uncooperative wretch. It really could take all day. He locked the door behind him to keep that rabble from doing something stupid.

Horace paced dramatically, then asked, "You think you're clever, Snape? No one believes your word against Albus Dumbledore's. Why don't you stop wasting everyone's time and recant your accusations. I'll open the floo and you tell Magical Law Enforcement that Albus Dumbledore had your permission to enter your house and pick up items for you."

Severus sometimes thought about ideal situations, that would never occur, but still thought of them, and what he would do. It broke up the constant reliving in his head of every defeat, humiliation and beating. What if … He had to admit his luck in the past year, once he recovered from dragonpox had drastically improved. Surviving a werewolf was more than he could have hoped for. Could he risk letting Slughorn think he'd go along with his idea? Would Slughorn even believe him? He was the head of Slytherin. He was also right. Dumbledore had the weight of public opinion on his side. There would probably be some dramatic revelation if he allowed the Wizengamot to hear anything. Some simple explanation ending in the return of the cup to the Smiths.

"I do have a lot of homework this weekend," Severus admitted, "and I promised others that I'd meet them in the library … could we just get this over with, professor?"

Horace looked at Snape shrewdly. Homework? Albus letting Snape be head boy had gone to the scum's head. His deplorable scribblings would not amount to anything. The money meant nothing since the purebloods would ensure it would return to the ones they found more deserving of it. He Who Must Not Be Named and his Death Eaters were clear on their views. With this provocation from Snape, Albus would probably still try to save him because he was like that, but Albus' allies were not going to be as generous.

"Very well. You know what you are to say?"

"Yes, sir. Albus Dumbledore, you said, has permission to enter my properties as you said and he may collect per your instructions what he needs," Severus intentionally added phrases in the middle. Barty had told him about the Ministry collecting memories as proof. If he said it straightforward to Slughorn, would they be able to use that as permission?

Horace knew Severus was saying it oddly, but why? Was he trying to be an annoying pain in the ass still? Snape knew he had lost, why drag it out? "A little more naturally, Snape, and leave out the part about what I told you."

"Yes, sir," he replied readily as Slughorn took some floo powder out of an ornate covered dish. Severus kept his face blank as Slughorn appeared to be following through on his plan to floo Magical Law Enforcement at the Ministry.

Horace clearly announced, "Magical Law Enforcement," and the flame turned green. Turning to Snape, he demanded, "Get down there and tell them."

Severus was unaccustomed to speaking in a floo, but knelt down to speak into the grate. "Hello?"

"Yes?"

"My name is Severus Snape. I'm at Hogwarts."

"Yes?"

"Uh, last year when I was at St. Mungo's, I was asked to floo or write if any staff at Hogwarts beat or threatened me with physical harm."

"What's your name again?"

"Severus … Snape," he said, yelling the last part as Slughorn tugged him away shouting, "What the hell do you think you're doing? Get away from that floo, you ungrateful malefactor."

"Hello? Who's that?"

"Sorry … one of the students felt like playing a little joke …"

While Slughorn verbally danced around, Severus worked fast with his wand to get to work on himself, and coaxing more blood to leak out of his nose, transfiguring a belt strap similar to his father's, multiplying his blood and letting it drip, besides smearing some on the belt and drying it … since it was from his last beating since he did not want to stripe his own behind with fresh wounds. Then shoved his wand under Slughorn's desk and cast _lumos _and _nox _repeatedly and as quickly as he could before Slughorn caught him. Even when making excuses the bloated fool enjoyed listening to himself talk.

The voice on the other side of the connection changed, "No, no, I think it best I investigate, Professor. That student, or at least the one the prankster named, is of interest to this office. Please stand back."

Severus purposely slumped next to the desk and tried to look more miserable. A bleeding nose and lip, and an ache around one of his eyes was hardly new to him. Recognizing Gumboil, Severus did not know if that was good or bad. Why was he always around?

It was difficult not to smile or laugh as Slughorn turned to indicate he was fine, and found he wasn't. Enough blood had leaked out to stain the front of his jumper red, besides it being on the back of his hand and cuff when he wiped it before stopping the hasty multiplying spell. Due to Gamp's Law he needed some of his own blood to create more.

"What did … you ..." Slughorn was spluttering. What insanity was this? His eyes scanned the shelf of jars. Did he even have blood in here? Ah, dragon blood. Couldn't trust the students with that. "It's dragon blood," he explained. Then added, "And you will pay for it, Snape."

"What?" Snape whined. "It's my blood. Isn't there some test for that?"

"Why would they bother testing it? I'm saying it's dragon blood from my personal stores, you little sneak thief."

"How do you normally get dragon's blood, professor?" Alastor Gumboil asked seeing the strap.

"I purchase it with my own funds. It's not part of the curriculum."

"You don't beat it out of them?"

"Of course not. That's his belt."

"It appears Snape is still wearing his. All I need to do is a couple of charms."

"If you insist," Slughorn dismissively replied while waving his hand.

Gumboil did identify it as Severus Snape's blood, and the dried blood on the belt as his also. "This blood is dry," he commented.

"He didn't use that on me today," Severus explained. "That was for me if I did not cooperate and tell you that the school staff could have whatever they wanted from my recent inheritance."

"Oh ho!"

Lunging at Snape, Slughorn spit, "How dare you!"

"Now, now, you are in enough trouble already, Prof. Slughorn."

"Trouble? That wretch is nothing but trouble. He should have been expelled as a first year."

"Snape, can I get you to St. Mungo's for that?"

"It looks worse than it is. I can go to the Infirmary if I can't sort it."

"If I recall correctly, you go fighting werewolves with a concussion."

"Oh please," Slughorn moaned.

"We're going," Gumboil answered him.

"Not till that slime's out of my office."

Severus got up, and noted that Gumboil had already taken possession of the strap.

"Wait," Slughorn said, turning back at Snape. "Why don't you check his wand? Use _prior_ and you'll see what a sneak he is."

Slughorn was confused as Snape held his wand forth without any hesitation.

Gumboil cast _Prior Incanto_ and got a result of _nox. _ A second cast of _Prior Incanto _resulted in _lumos_. With a sigh of exasperation, Alastor Gumboil recommended, "You are testing my patience, Professor. Getting Dumbledore to close the abuse case on this student does not mean that the prior beatings are not still prosecutable."

"What are you talking about? There was mix-up with some medical records."

"If that's the case, St. Mungo's can always have another look at this student," he replied. Alastor Gumboil may not have been in the Slug Club, but that did not make him stupid. He had to work all these hours and get cases closed with results, unlike Slughorn's recommended favorites. Merlin, how he longed that his transfer over to become a hit wizard came through. There was no talking in that job, just show up and start stunning, rather than having to listen to lying, whinging and pleading.

"Another look at what?"

Severus asked, "Can I go see Madam Pomfrey now please?" If he stayed here much longer, at the very least a smirk, but probably an outright smile would spread across his face. For the head of Slytherin, Slughorn could be awfully dull.

Emerging from Slughorn's office, Severus found at least two dozen students in the hall.

"Sev!" shouted Lily, having to shoulder her way through some others that got in her way.

"What?" he muttered.

"What happened?" was asked by a couple of students.

"Slughorn got a bit carried away with trying to persuade me that I should share my bounty with the staff."

While gasping and discussion broke out, Lily reached up and touched his face. "Oh, Sev, can I fix this?"

"I guess. Slughorn opened a floo to Magical Law Enforcement to have me tell them that Albus Dumbledore had my permission to take whatever he wanted, and I did not stick to the script. Gumboil's taking him to the Ministry for questioning. He saw me."

"Can I use _episkey _on a black eye too?"

"Give it a try."

Lily cast the spell three times, on Sev's eye, nose and lip, then cleaned his jumper.

Severus noticed that many of the students had their wands out and held defensively. MacDonald and Lily were the only two Gryffindors, most were Slytherins friendly to him, but Summerby was here with another Hufflepuff, and there were some Ravenclaws that he remembered shared a table with him during Herbology after his article about Unspeakables in The Quibbler.

"Should we retreat to the heads' rooms?" Mary asked.

"Maybe we should tell another teacher," Lily suggested.

"More than one, we don't know who agrees with Dumbledore and Slughorn, ready to line up to pick up their own souvenirs" advised Wilkes. They'd want to unlock vaults next. Maybe they'd think Mary had too much money next. Slughorn missed out on getting his hands on Black's money, and was now out for whatever he could lay his pudgy fingers on. He couldn't live on quidditch tickets alone once he retired.

They split up with Severus, Lily, Mary and Malcolm among the group going to the fourth floor. Lily hung onto his arm the entire way and then steered him to where she wanted him to sit beside her.

As before, Severus had to endure a lot of speculation around him. Though at least this time, Slughorn had actually wanted Severus to lie about Dumbledore. He was not a gormless dupe till Severus thought for himself. Severus had outmaneuvered his first two ideas about dragon blood and using _Prior Incanto. _ What other ideas might he try? A transfigured belt was a transfigured belt whether created today or years ago. Hm, the problem was Slughorn could be clever, especially in his own self-interest. Black and Potter could not do that.

The Ravenclaws came back with Prof. Flitwick. Filius had been shocked by such tales from his students. Ravenclaws were an extraordinarily creative group, but Horace arrested for beating Severus Snape to get him to give permission for Hogwarts staff to enter his new home and take what they liked? Lunacy!

After Summerby and her girlfriend attempted to find Prof. Abstractus, then failed to find Prof. Upsilon, they decided that perhaps Prof. McGonagall could help. They already knew that Prof. Sprout was tricked by Dumbledore over Helga Hufflepuff's cup. To think, Prof. Sprout had the actual cup in her hands, then he took it. A prefect got into the head's office on some pretext, but it was nowhere to be seen. If Dumbledore took it for the school, why didn't any of them get to see it? It might as well be with the rightful owners, the Smith family. At least then, it would be in the hands of Hufflepuff's family. Perhaps that's why Dumbledore refused to give up being headmaster when it was clear he needed to be in London at the Ministry and taking care of He Who Must Not Be Named. Stealing from the school and students, and the extent of it might be found out too soon if there was a new headmaster or headmistress during his lifetime. It seemed that Gyrffindor house cultivated these really terrible people who lived to lie, cheat, steal and make others suffer. Only one or two of them were enough to ruin everything.

Minerva's eyes widened at the … tale the two students relayed to her. Horace took Mr. Snape down to his office to beat him? With an audience? Even though they assured her that Evans sorted Snape's injuries, she flooed Poppy and Pomona and asked they meet her in the head students' common room. If Horace did anything even remotely improper, after trying to seduce a recently widowed mother of a student, and after that scurrilous article that quoted him and his methods in Witch Weekly, there was no way he'd be able to keep his position here. Albus would simply have to sack him. Horace had been teasing them with talk for years about retiring so he could travel, attend more parties and cozy weekends at country manors, and not be bogged down with teaching. Well, maybe it was time to show him the door so he could get on with it.

She found that Filius had arrived first. As the story was retold each time a new staff member entered the room, Minerva was moving from low simmer to boil. Of course, other students were upset. Detention was the only acceptable punishment for a minor offense. And this was no offense at all. What kind of crackpot scheme had Albus and Horace cooked up? They couldn't go to students' houses and take things. It was bad enough Albus confiscated that heirloom, and since the Wizengamot was willing to hear it, it was not a simple case like taking a girlie magazine, which Albus was still hesitant to do. The instances of attacks on female students dropped to almost zero after they swept the school last year for pornographic materials. The man did not have his priorities straight.

Poppy looked over Miss Evans' work on Mr. Snape's pockmarked face. It was sufficient, though she did detect that _episkey_ had been used on his nose frequently in the past. Snape mentioned it had not felt broken earlier, just very bloody. He also added he was not strapped today so there was no need to look further than his face. Not strapped today. What had Horace been covering up all these years? And … AND making her his silent accomplice who would take the blame for whenever anyone found out.

Pomona Sprout took a seat. This was all very distressing. After her second cup of tea, she was in agreement with Minerva in their whispered conversation. The four of them should confront Albus. No matter what his plan was, which he should explain to them immediately, it did not excuse this sort of treatment of a student. He should also consider rather than sneaking into someone's house in the company of a known pilferer that it would have been the polite thing to ask and explain his reasoning, rather than this heavy-handed method of taking what was not his by force.

**********************

Albus admitted he did not have the energy at this age to verbally spar with Bartemius Crouch all night. He was telling the truth, no matter how Barty phrased his questions. There could be dangerous things in that house. Albus also had to find that locket and see if it was a second horcrux.

He had to get Dung out still, was what he was thinking as he descended to his office to talk over this setback with his council of former headmasters and headmistresses and have a bite to eat, when there was a knocking on his door. Albus bid them to enter, wondering how many times this morning Minerva had tried to gain admittance. She looked quite determined.

"You look a little peaked, Albus. Don't you think there could be a simpler way to go about this then sneaking about, spending the night incarcerated and then taking out your frustration at not pulling off a daring heist on a student?"

Minerva always was a harsh judge, however Filius, Poppy and Pomona were looking rather stern also.

"I admit things did not go smoothly at all. Barty thinks the worst ..."

"It's not the worst?" Poppy prompted.

"No, not at all." Albus gazed at them with growing worry as they all crossed their arms over their chest for a further explanation. "It was a foolhardy thing to try since the house is thoroughly booby trapped."

"You might want to know that the house elf that notified Mr. Snape of the break-in gave him two options, kill you immediately or let you starve to death," Minerva informed him. "They aren't used to him yet, and could still act on their own if you attempt again."

With a slight smile, Albus said, "Ah, you know me too well, Minerva. Anyway no harm done."

All four mouths dropped open, and Filius repeated in a high voice, "No harm done? Is that what Horace is saying at the Ministry, right now?"

"Horace?"

Poppy leapt in, "He was beating Snape for not allowing you in that foul house."

"Beating?"

"Only some smacks to the face this time, Severus said he didn't get a chance to use the strap today," Minerva informed him.

"What are you talking about?"

"The scheme to have Mr. Snape deny the charges against you failed spectacularly, Albus. Horace probably has not gotten his one floo call to let you know yet," Pomona said tightly.

"I'm not sure what you mean," Albus explained, not understanding why Horace would be at the Ministry needing to floo him.

"Stop protesting and listen then," Minerva scolded. "Horace took Mr. Snape off to his office at breakfast this morning. He instructed Mr. Snape to make a statement to Magical Law Enforcement that either you or the Hogwarts staff had his permission or blessing to enter his new house and take whatever they wanted. The floo call was made. Severus did not say what Horace told him to say, and they reached through the floo, hauling Horace down to London."

"Why would they do that? What did Severus say?"

Poppy put her hands on her hips and said, "The truth, you ninny. He finally had them catch Horace in the act. It was an open floo connection and Horace was threatening and beating him to make that statement that you could steal whatever you wanted."

"I … I wasn't stealing."

"You took Hufflepuff's cup from me," Pomona reminded them all. "It wasn't yours. It does not belong to Hogwarts."

"It was too dangerous. Oh dear, this is a mess. I suppose I need to go back to London and get Horace freed, along with Dung. I think they kept him too."

"Who exactly is Dung, other than a thief with a criminal record? Has he helped you break into other students' homes while they are school after you learn that have no other family members?" Filius asked, voicing the concern of the students about what was uncovered with Mr. Snape.

"Where would you get such an idea?"

"You. You were caught at that house last night."

"You know how the newspaper sensationalizes everything."

Minerva rolled her eyes, "Oh yes, and I'm sure tomorrow's issue will clear it all up. Do you want Severus to pose for a photo with you throttling him?"

"I would never do that to a student."

"Is that what you've kept Horace around for all these years?"

**********************

Severus spent the rest of the day with a lot of company wherever he went. He was allowed to work quietly in his room on his arithmancy project as long as his door was left ajar to their common room. What did they think he was going to do? It was hard to concentrate if he tried to listen to them and work on his arithmancy at the same time, but even with Slytherins present, it sounded like their ideas were a bit mad. Severus was not going to tell them what parts actually happened and what didn't, so he guessed this is what he was stuck listening to.

It was actually a good location for most of them to spend the day once they fetched their homework and made trips to the library. Anyone that was not a member of the defense study group was invited to return on Friday evening to join it.

Lily was unsure of what they could do, but felt there was safety in numbers. What did all this mean? Was Dumbledore only interested in keeping He Who Must Not Be Named's lot out of the school for payment? Shouldn't that be part of the headmaster's job protecting the students? Besides, Dumbledore didn't do anything about Sirius Black because the Gryffindors tackled him.

Mary had been having a difficult week. She liked Severus. She still liked Malcolm. Now Severus had been hurt, but Malcolm was sticking close to help protect him. Or was Malcolm sticking close because Mary had to protect Severus? Mary knew she had to due to the life debt, but in her conscious she knew that all this with Dumbledore and Slughorn was wrong. They were big bullies. Using their positions, age and reputation to get what they wanted, like two spoiled brats.

The arithmancy group showed up for their tutoring after dinner. Since Sirius Black showed up in the Gryffindor common room, they met here with the warning not to make a mess or their tutoring would be over. This week there were enough competent arithmancy students present to give them all one-on-one tutoring.

Prof. McGonagall stopped in to check on things. Earlier, Prof. Flitwick had joined them.

After she left, Severus had retreated back to his room. The others were evaluating Gryffindors' inability to do anything mathematical. Severus had already seen this bunch attempt to do arithmancy.

Lily came in to watch him, and had not realized that magic played such a part in arithmancy later. Numbers and symbols were writing themselves as he stared at the parchment after laying down his equation and released the quill. What were all the books of tables for then?

When it finished, Lily leaned closer to look over his shoulder. Severus tilted his head and asked, "What?"

"Can I sleep in here tonight, Sev?"

"Alright."

"Thanks," Lily replied and gave him a hug and a kiss on the cheek before leaving his room.

When she came back a short while later, she reminded him, "Can you call Phi in?"

"Now?" Severus asked.

"Yeah, Crouch and Black are staying up here tonight."

"Why?"

"Don't worry about it, Sev."

Severus was not worried about them. He supposed they were alright, and a lot better than a bunch of Gryffindors having a party in the next room all night. Did they ask to stay here, or did Lily ask them?

When he went into the next room to use their window overlooking the lake in the common room, he saw Wilkes in his pajamas and robe. Slytherins and their pajamas. Black and Crouch were also wearing fancy nightclothes, robes and slippers.

After Severus called Phi in, he mentioned, "I usually close both stairwells to Gryffindor and Slytherin for the night. Should I leave Slytherin's open for you to go back and forth?"

"No, we're done down there for the night," Wilkes responded.

Severus grunted and set about blocking both stairwells with stone. Lily and MacDonald knew the passwords in an emergency.

When he went back into his room, locked and warded the door, he went to the lavatory door and asked Lily, "Wilkes is staying too?"

"Oh yeah. Our bath's ready, Sev."

They fooled around in the tub, finished bathing, and after Severus put on his nightshirt, he slid into bed after checking that Phi's bowls were full.

"You're going to sleep, Sev?"

"I don't know. Are we?"

"Uh, I guess," Lily said, growing more nervous. Would they hear anything in here? Would Slughorn or Dumbledore try something? She got under the covers next to Severus, and asked, "Can you leave some light by the door?"

"Alright," he agreed and left two candles lit over there. "Leave the curtains open?" he asked, referring to the bed hangings. Lily had changed her mind on them. When they were closed, it was just the two of them and nothing else, but it also felt isolated. She seemed jumpy with candles lit and having Slytherins stay the night.

"Yes, please," Lily responded as she pressed herself against her friend, on her side, facing him.

Severus spent a moment glancing around then stowed his wand before laying down on his back, with his head turned towards Lily. She gave him a brief kiss then tucked her face against his neck and put her hand flat on his chest.

Within minutes, Severus started to snore. How could he sleep at a time like this, Lily asked herself. She closed her eyes but couldn't stop thinking about everything that was wrong. Why couldn't normal good things happen to her friend? Finally being a half-blood meant something, but the windfall was tainted since it was from his father's killers. Then adults, who were supposedly role models, wanted to loot it before Sev even got a good look at it. He'd have enough money to remodel Spinner's End now. That had to be better than whatever house the Lestranges had. Maybe some full-blood fanatic with too much money would want to buy it in order to keep it out of Sev's hands.

Disgusted with herself that Sev was getting a good night's sleep, Lily slid out of bed and searched for something boring to read. Sev's Ancient Rune homework was actually pretty interesting. Maybe if more people knew this Loki bloke's punishment being bound with the entrails of his son, and his wife had to hold a bowl over him to keep painful snake venom from dripping onto his face till Ragnorak, there might be less pranking.

Lily flicked through Sev's mail looking for a letter from Longbottom or Lovegood. Who's Damocles? Lily opened that one. Sev had a potions apprenticeship offer already? Why didn't he say anything? Was there something wrong with this Damocles?

She put that one away and felt another one had something in it. Lily was right, it was a photo. She remembered this girl was a Ravenclaw, and her family was proposing marriage? What kind of stupidity was this? She didn't talk to Sev when she was a student. Maybe she should stay in Russia, Lily thought in disgust as she folded the letter back around the ugly photo.

Girls that never liked Sev before were talking to him. At first she thought they wanted to use him for the fancy dress party, but it might be about this inheritance.

Mary might be a bit flighty with going after Malcolm again, however, she never had anything in common with Severus.

Also, earlier Severus was over at the Hufflepuff table talking to that Summerby girl from the fancy dress party. What could he talk about with a sixth year that would have her following him around the rest of the day?

**********************

After seeing yesterday's newspaper, Lord Voldemort had been tempted to impulsively set out for Lestrange Manor to search for whatever Dumbledore had thought was there. However, he thought it over since he needed a plan. It seemed that Dumbledore and whoever Fletcher was, they were there without the permission of the current owner … Severus Snape again. Snape was in school for now, and although Dumbledore could allow Snape to leave school at any time to go to the manor and retrieve whatever he wanted, he hadn't. At this point, it looked unlikely that Snape would cooperate since he already accused Dumbledore of theft, and he might have a pair of bollocks so big that he would not allow Dumbledore to drag him there against his will and force Snape to turn over what he wanted.

So what did Dumbledore expect to find in Lestrange manor? Lord Voldemort had visited it many times, both as a Hogwarts student as a guest of his fellow student, and as a guest of Rabastan and Rodolphus. He believed everything had been laid open to him. Dark Arts books, treatises and antiquities. Had they removed something from the vault besides Hufflepuff's cup? He had seen the vault with its heaps and mounds of gold and goods, but he had not dug through their junk of centuries to see if there was anything valuable amongst it all. The cup would have been safe in the vault as one more piece of crap. Why had they taken it out? Was it related to their disobedience that resulted in their deaths? Was it some plot amongst the Blacks to depose him based on the questionable information from the Ministry regarding him? What true follower of his would actually believe Lord Voldemort's parentage to be so base?

Lord Voldemort summoned Cygnus Black to him to answer some questions. A few applications of _crucio _yielded no new information. Cygnus could not recall any objects of interest to the Dark Lord at Lestrange Manor nor what his nephew could have been plotting with his daughter and the other Lestranges. He swore that all three were loyal to none other than their Lord. He also swore he knew nothing about who their possible heirs would be. He had hoped Bella would settle down and have a child soon. The man actually wept real tears over that. It was disgusting. Staying his hand from ending this ridiculous display with a killing curse, since the quantity of his followers had been dwindling with no worthy new recruits appearing, he recommended Cygnus find out what was in that house.

His hesitance to act paid off. Today's newspaper was also full of good news. All Lord Voldemort had to do was wait a day. Horace Slughorn was caught beating Severus Snape by Magical Law Enforcement. Voldemort laughed aloud as he read that old Slughorn had opened a floo connection to the Ministry before slapping around the head boy and threatening him with a belt unless he made a statement to Magical Law Enforcement that Albus Dumbledore had his permission to enter his home and remove whatever objects he saw fit. Oh, and if he could still weep tears of joy, he'd be wiping his eyes now because there was some cover up in the past regarding Snape. St. Mungo's had dutifully reported to Magical Law Enforcement about scars from beatings, and also pressed the Ministry when after that he was found to have a concussion and painful scalds on his torso during two follow-up examinations. Albus Dumbledore arranged to have that investigation closed.

Hm, this other article by Rita Skeeter … never any fan of Albus Dumbledore … suggested that at least Dumbledore knew that Snape would receive this large inheritance and that is why he appointed Snape head boy, in an effort to curry the young man's favor and gratitude by way of gifts from the former Lestrange fortune. She referred to her article in Witch Weekly which quoted Horace Slughorn regarding gratitude and gifts in return for favors from the Hogwarts staff. Head boy was a huge favor for a student who was not a prefect, nor even a quidditch player.

Voldemort was not entirely convinced by that reasoning. Beat him, set him to cleaning lavatories every evening, and then believe the title of head boy would even things out? Even if Snape was the stupidest Slytherin ever sorted into the house, no. If Voldemort was in that position, he may let a couple objects go while he bided his time and planned his revenge, but if Dumbledore's first move was to authoritatively claim Helga Hufflepuff's cup as his initial payment, he would find himself stabbed in the eye with the head boy pin. Adding Slughorn and this professional thief, Mundungus Fletcher, to the plot, there would be nothing left in that house or vault by June. Standing firm on that first theft was the only way to ever see one knut of that inheritance.

Dumbledore seemed to have a tidal wave of negative publicity. Would he be able to smile his way through it all as if he were serenely posing for a chocolate frog card? With all his plots, did he even have time left for attempting to thwart Lord Voldemort? If the whole fiasco was not so ludicrous … wait, was that Dumbledore's real plan? To garner all this negative publicity and appear tied up with these absurd legal matters? When in truth, he was about to spring some trap on him and come out of it as the ridiculous hero who overcame all this adversity to win in the end?

He beginning to suspect there was nothing of interest at Lestrange Manor, when he was slipped a copy of another interesting inquiry that Crouch had opened. Salazar Slytherin's locket … and they thought that Lestrange stole it from Smith when he stole the cup and it was somewhere at their home. So that is what Dumbledore was after? But if he destroyed the cup … but he only _said_ he destroyed the cup. Lord Voldemort had not felt anything. The cup may be stashed away somewhere and the old man may have no clue what it was. If Lestrange was thought to have both of the founders' items for thirty years, perhaps he did not know they were his horcrux.

Voldemort did know one thing for sure. He would not be trusting his diary or Slytherin's locket to Cygnus Black. His daughter's disloyalty and idiot tendencies were likely inherited from her parents.

**********************

AN: I almost made a big blunder on the locket. It can't be in the sea cave because Voldemort could not use Kreacher yet. I think I replied to someone it was in the cave … I'm sorry. I guess it can't be there yet. Doh!

AN: Sirius is not as effected by Azkaban as Remus, because, like in canon, he believes himself innocent. LOL

AN: With the close voting on the poll, I think we like the same story ideas :^)


	51. Chapter 51 Suspension and Suspicion

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

**Snape's Worst Memory**

**Chapter 51 Suspension and Suspicion**

Eyebrows raised when it was reported that Dumbledore had been suspended from the Wizengamot until all his legal matters were settled. Did these matters have some substance to cause concern? It was Albus Dumbledore, for Merlin's sake, how could anyone accuse him of doing wrong?

There was other news in the newspaper of interest. Sirius Black's trial was starting this week. Lily thought it was about time. It had been a year since Helen was murdered. If the Ministry had not let Black walk out to flee to France then, Sev's parents would be alive, Pettigrew might even be alive, and perhaps still in school with Potter. Heck, Black could have manned up to his crime and confessed that Lupin knew nothing of the plan. Yup, she thought sarcastically, Sirius Black was a real pal. Was his brother, Regulus, capable of being such a two-faced backstabber? He seemed close with Crouch, but he wasn't buddies with Sev.

Severus was not happy with Lily. He thought she purposely did not mention that Malcolm and Mary had spent the night in her room. They were seventeen, and it was none of his business. After all this time, did he feel something for Mary? He still called her MacDonald.

By lunch the news had spread through the school. Slughorn had been suspended from teaching till his legal matter was resolved. Seems the Board of Governors were not as lenient as Dumbledore when it came to bullying and torturing students.

Lily had to wait till Tuesday to find out their substitute Potions teacher was the Muggle Studies teacher. He confessed Potions were not his forte so begged them to continue on with their lessons without any mishap. He used the threat of their NEWT in June to give them incentive to not decimate the dungeons.

*********************

Mundungus Fletcher had barely sat in the uncomfortable wooden chair when he was sentenced to two years in Azkaban, based on his prior record. He didn't even lay a finger on one precious object in that foul house. His eyes searched for Dumbledore, but he was not here. Where could he be? Was he already working on Dung's appeal to get him out?

Meanwhile, Dumbledore's solicitor came to Hogwarts to visit him. He was concerned that he had not been consulted yet about any defense regarding theft, attempted theft or even abuse of students, in case Horace Slughorn tried to indicate that Albus approved of such things. Everyone knew he didn't, but Horace could turn quite glib when his ass was on the line.

Like many times before, Albus seemed unconcerned, and admitted he may not even need the services of his solicitor. He pressed Albus for some information. Albus was known for his truthfulness, but he had a definite flair for getting overly dramatic at times. Perhaps he should share his plans with someone? No, no … that was not to be the case. Albus thanked him for his concern and going through the trouble of stopping by, but told him nothing. He didn't even get to see the blasted cup that all this uproar was about.

There was someone who had absolute faith in Albus Dumbledore's ability to gold-plate a pile of shit, and that was his brother, Aberforth. He talked it over with Lizzie and Ethel while he was brushing them. He reminded them that Albus had been tracking down Snape last Valentine's Day. This was not some sudden mad impulse of his brother's to take up a life of crime to pay off his tab at Honeyduke's; it was a plan of some sort. However, if Albus was going to spend months on a plan, shouldn't it be defeating He Who Must Not Be Named, rather than breaking into empty houses? If You Know Who gave the key to his downfall to one of those loathsome Lestranges, why would Albus still think it was at their house? He had months to go retrieve it. He Who Must Not Be Named would not wait till an heir came forward and politely ask to retrieve his property.

*********************

Remus was thinking … one year. He had attacked innocent people and killed one a year ago. His friend, or someone who said he was his friend … his friend, what did that mean? James was his friend. But James did not warn anyone when he found out what Sirius did. He did nothing while people were in the Shrieking Shack with him.

James did eventually get him out of Azkaban, but did not visit or write till he found himself alone and then expelled, once Peter died. Was James his true friend, or was Remus just an afterthought? Someone to listen to James talk about quidditch. That last game hardly made an impression on James. So many people there to cheer for the Wigtown Wanderers because of Helen Parkin … the girl who was his murder victim.

They talked about Sirius Black. Remus mostly listened, but really had no idea what Sirius was doing. How could he? None of them really knew Sirius. He may have only been sorted into Gryffindor because he did not think. He could be as nasty as any Slytherin, but Sirius just did it. There was no cunning or finesse, just attack, attack, attack and then laugh about it.

The Daily Prophet listed horrible things for Sirius. They knew he attacked muggles with James and Peter. They knew he sent unknowing students to a spot where Dumbledore was hiding a werewolf. The students were attacked. One died, and one was infected. They knew Sirius fled to France, rather than be reprimanded or punished for that. While abroad, Sirius kept in contact with his family and Death Eaters. Sirius returned to England to secretly meet with his father and killed him. Then his plan to murder his younger brother went awry, and he was captured at Hogwarts.

Even though James disputed the attack on that muggle pub, so much was true, that Remus was believing the rest of it. Why else would Sirius go to Hogwarts? Why did he open the floo to James' parents? Was he looking for James to help him? Prongs may go for the occasional prank and could hot-headedly do some stupid things, but he wasn't a killer. Perhaps Sirius realized he ended up nowhere close to Regulus, and was going to escape to the Potters.

James interrupted Remus' thoughts, by cheerily greeting him as he came in from flying, "Hey, Moony."

"Prongs."

"I was thinking. I might want to give this place up since I'm no longer a Cannon."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, I mean … it's kind of boring. There's only one place to go dancing 'round here, and the witches are kind of uh … homely 'round these parts."

"I hadn't noticed."

"Yeah, there's prettier witches down south. Maybe London. If we had a nice place there … bigger with guest rooms, we could have our friends visit."

Remus nodded. Even people that did not live in London visited it. His parents might find it convenient to stay with them when they went down to London. They didn't go there much, but they'd come more if Remus was living there.

"So," James continued, "if we move out the end of November, I was thinking of spending a month at my parents for the holidays. Mum's lonely without me home."

"Uh huh."

"And that'll give me at least a month to try out for more teams so I might find us a new place close to where I'll be playing."

Remus' eyebrow cocked. There was optimism, but James was deluded. Enough bad press came out over that Chudley Cannons game, and the Parkin family had plenty to say about James wanting their daughter off the Gryffindor team so badly, he went along with Sirius Black's plot to kill her.

"Um … so where am I going?" Remus asked.

"Don't you want to visit your parents, Moony? I guess my parents will be glad to have you 'round too."

He frowned at James. Was Remus just an insignificant detail?

********************

Severus finally let his true feelings be known to Lily once they retired to his bedroom one evening, after the girls liberated his wireless to dance with a pajamaed Wilkes, who was staying over again.

"Has Wilkes made MacDonald any promises?"

"What kind of promises, Sev?"

"Any. She could be worse after he dumps her a second time."

"What makes you think he will?"

"I don't know, that's why I'm asking you. You are letting them use your bed with your blessing, Lily."

"Mary's lonely."

He huffed at her. Shagging was Lily's answer to that. MacDonald did not need Wilkes to shag. The school was full of teenage males.

"What?" Lily demanded. "Why are you bothering?"

"Because I don't want to be woken up by them fighting or more days of MacDonald crying."

"She's my friend, Sev."

"I do not understand why this is a good idea."

"You don't need to. Besides, now Malcolm's more mature. He's able to deal with things better. That werewolf attack last year was a big shock to all of us."

Severus made a face. If Wilkes dropped MacDonald because she was a werewolf last year, what was different? She was still a werewolf this year, and would be for the rest of her life.

He sat down at his desk to work further on his project.

Lily stared at him. That was it? Was that even like a fight? Or was Sev just dismissing her feelings on it? Why did he even bring it up? He should be happy for Mary. Now she wouldn't be batting her eyes at Sev and talking to him all the time.

She got onto the bed and lay across it watching him. Why was Severus so puzzling?

********************

Albus wanted to help Horace, but his old friend was purposely altering his memory of what happened that morning with poor results every time Albus viewed it in the pensieve.

The memory was jumpy with omissions and cloudiness, and if Albus moved around the office while viewing it, there were distracting flashes of light with no explanation. He was even hiding the leather strap. It would start with nothing on the desk but then appear when the fellow from the Ministry picked it up.

Horace complained he was trying, but he would not withdraw the memory starting earlier so he could view it continuously. It started with Severus stiltedly stating something about Albus having his permission, but the fire was not green. It jumped to Horace talking into the floo, rather than Severus.

Addtionally, Albus knew Horace did not store his dragon's blood openly in his office for any student to steal, smash or accidentally knock over, so it was unlikely Severus found it and transfigured it into his own blood.

********************

After a couple days of noticing Mr. Filch hanging around the library, Severus approached him and asked, "How are you doing, Mr. Filch?"

"Me? Uh, fine. Got my hands full with detentions again."

Severus nodded, then asked, "Do you need help with anything around the school, sir?"

"Help?"

"Yes, though I'd prefer not to land myself with detention, but I do appreciate everything I learned last year."

"You do?"

"Yes, my parents died so I have their house. It's old and needed repairs. I wouldn't have known what to do without you."

"Huh," was all Filch could think of by way of a reply to that piece of information. Students did not thank him for detention. Maybe Slughorn had hit Snape too hard in the head. Turning away from him, he decided to call, "I'll let you know if I come across any jobs that are interesting, Snape."

"Thank you, Mr. Filch."

When he met up with Mrs. Norris later, he told her, "I think you were right. Snape's alright. It's that Slughorn polluting the school with his favors that they mentioned in that …," Filch lowered his voice and whispered, "women's magazine." Resuming his normal phlegmy tone and shaking his head, Argus intoned, "Shameful, Mrs. Norris. Shameful."

********************

At last, Sirius' day in court arrived. He didn't think it would take more than an hour or so, especially when he saw that his darling Apolline and her parents showed up to support him. He could only give her a smile because of all these chains. Stupid Ministry wanted to make a good show out of this.

Ugh, it was that ugly bastard from Law Enforcement, Bumboil. He was sitting next to a real jerkwad with a little mustache and slicked hair, parted down the center and wearing a pin-striped wizard robe. There was even a bowler hat on the table in front of him. Sirius sneered at the sight of them. Ministry lackeys. Merlin save him.

He sat and rolled his eyes as they talked and talked and then talked some more. When were they going to get to the facts? Sirius had not done anything bad, and they should be in trouble for sending him up to Azkaban for a couple weeks without any sort of proof that he did anything.

Oh no, the pinstriped pinhead was going to ask him questions.

"Mr. Black, did you know where Albus Dumbledore had Remus Lupin transform into a werewolf each month?"

"Yes."

"Did you lead other students to that place?"

"No."

"Do you know how they ended up there at that time?"

"Severus Snape must have told them."

"You definitely know that Severus Snape knew that Remus Lupin transformed into a werewolf every month in the Shrieking Shack?"

"Nooo," Sirius replied in an exasperated tone. "I didn't tell him there would be a werewolf there. What would be the fun in that?"

Bartemius Crouch was not in the mood for adolescent games. "Let me rephrase it then. You told others about a secret passage to use on the night of the full moon, knowing that there would be a werewolf there?"

"Not others. Just Snape."

"Why are you making such a distinction, Black?"

"It's thanks to Snape those people got killed or hurt. Not me. I didn't tell them."

Once the murmuring died down, which Sirius attributed to their realization that the wrong person was on trial, Crouch asked, "Why would you think he would go for a walk alone to look at a rumored new secret passage? The passage is under a whomping willow. That is a very dangerous tree."

"So? It's their fault for going with him."

"Why did you run instead of answering these questions last year?"

"I answered these questions already. I didn't do anything wrong."

"You purposely left Great Britain."

"So what? I was marrying the most wonderful woman in the world, and she didn't live here."

"We'll get to Miss Apolline soon enough."

Sirius smiled, directing it at his beloved. She looked shocked at his roguish behavior and covered her eyes with a white-gloved, dainty hand.

"You boasted to your comrades about informing one student about this secret passage then?"

"I couldn't exactly boast. We were in detention."

"Did you ask them to remain silent?"

"Of course."

"And that was Peter Pettigrew and James Potter?"

"Yes," Sirius replied in a bored tone. He couldn't well tell Moony that night.

"Their silence lasted long enough for your plan to come to fruition?"

"Huh?"

"Your comrades did as you asked, and did not warn anyone of the danger?"

"Of course. Snape's a pain in the ass."

"Was it entirely your plan, or did someone suggest it to you?"

"Suggest it? … No, it came to me during a fight."

"You lured at least one person intentionally to a werewolf because you were angry?"

"Why do you keep saying 'lure'? I didn't lure anyone. They walked there on their own."

"You gave information that was supposed to be kept secret? Dumbledore trusted Lupin, you, Potter and Pettigrew not to share that Lupin was a werewolf, nor where he could be found during the full moon."

"No."

"Dumbledore wanted you to tell that Lupin was a werewolf?"

"Nooo," Sirius moaned. This guy was a moron.

"You knew that Lupin was a werewolf. You also know that Dumbledore made the arrangements to hide him in the Shrieking Shack?"

"Yeeesss," Sirius tried replying slowly to see if it would sink in. These fellows were old and senile.

"What led you to believe that Dumbledore would want Lupin used, in his capacity as a werewolf, to get rid of students that were … as you said, 'a pain in the ass'?"

"What does Dumbledore have to do with it? It was Snape."

"Black, you are being given an opportunity to answer questions. If you choose not to answer them, the Wizengamot can come to its own decision," Barty warned. "Albus Dumbledore intentionally left a werewolf unguarded during nights of the full moon. You and your comrades knew this in advance. In a moment of anger, you chose to use Lupin to rid yourself of another student, Severus Snape. You told two other students of your plan, and by their silence, they agreed with you."

This fellow was trying to trick him by using a lot of words. The Ministry! Sirius chose not to answer anything. Where was Dumbledore anyway? Wasn't he one of the geezers that sat on the Wizengamot?

When Black also chose to use silence as assent, Barty continued, "And within two months, one of your conspirators, Peter Pettigrew, was also dead."

Sirius waited for a question, but when none was asked, he volunteered, "That was probably Snape."

"How would you know that, Black? Weren't you in ..." Barty pulled out the Blacks' itinerary of Europe, and continued, "... Rome, the night Pettigrew disappeared from Hogwarts?"

"I don't know."

"Miss Apolline was kind enough to keep track of where you two traveled. Since you were recently caught in the Gryffindor common room of Hogwarts, did you abduct Pettigrew from there?"

"That's nonsense … and why would you tell them anything, Apolline?"

Her father exclaimed something rude in French, and Barty added, "You are not to address your former wife, Black."

"Former?"

"We'll get to that soon enough."

"You have no desire to reveal what happened to Peter Pettigrew? His parents would like to know how he met his end."

"Why would I know?"

"You were also in Knockturn Alley to meet with your father. Did you have another moment of anger then?"

"You certainly knew my father," Sirius quipped.

"Is that a 'yes'?"

"No, you jackass."

"Did you ask someone to do in Peter Pettigrew and Orion Black?"

"No."

"You were in contact with Death Eaters while you traveled."

"No, I wasn't."

"All three Lestranges were Death Eaters. You knew that?"

"I suppose."

"You wrote at least one letter to Bellatrix Lestrange instructing her to attack specific muggles."

"I did not."

"Coincidentally the same muggle location you attacked in the summer of 1976 … along with Peter Pettigrew and James Potter."

"They attacked us."

"Yes, that's in the report. You three were demolishing a muggle pub for sport, and the patrons subdued you. Since one of the patrons was the muggle father of Severus Snape, he realized that the three of you were underaged wizards. The Ministry was contacted to pick the three of you up, but you used magic to escape, summoned the Knight Bus and due to the quick reporting of your crimes, Magical Law Enforcement was already waiting for you when you disembarked at Potter's house."

"They lied."

"The muggles had two of your wands. They didn't need any more proof than that that you were there. Along with this letter that was found at Lestrange Manor that has been verified as being written by you."

Sirius made a face, then said, "I may have written a letter, but they didn't need to do anything."

"Is that how you think this should go? You lie to students, leading them so they get attacked by a werewolf. You tell Death Eaters about muggles so vicious they attack wizards. You think that makes you as innocent as the day you were born?"

"Sure."

"You are no innocent, Black. You have caused the death of close to a dozen people, including muggles. You show not a shred of remorse. The longer you eluded repercussions, the more audacious your acts became. Your record at Hogwarts shows years of attacking students till someone was finally killed."

"Oh come on, that was only a bit of fun."

"In case you haven't noticed, Albus Dumbledore is not here to support that view. After attacking over a hundred female students at Hogwarts, you went to France and drugged Miss Apolline with love potion. You had her already marked as from a family that would help keep our Ministry of Magic tied up in negotiations, as long as you were not seen in Great Britain. You continually used that potion to have her provide alibis for your disappearances when you went missing for nights and for days at a time, while you took care of Peter Pettigrew and your own father, Orion Black, and who knows what else. You've been tied to having dealings with known Death Eaters. How many others did you join them in killing?"

"That's a lie. Apolline loves me."

"I do not! He lies! He uzed me!" Apolline exclaimed, then dramatically started sobbing while her parents comforted her. Every male in the room now knew what kind of animal Sirius Black was. How could he take advantage of such a beautiful and innocent young woman?

By the time the dust cleared, the crying ended, the fingers stopped pointing, and Sirius was further restrained, the decision was unanimous … life in Azkaban.

********************

Severus was suspicious. The Wizengamot actually punished people? The professional thief that broke into his house got two years in Azkaban, even though he was a friend of Dumbledore's. Now Sirius Black was given life. Was this to balance out the upcoming disasters with Slughorn and Dumbledore?

Walburga Black had not gone to the Ministry to see her eldest son, Sirius. How could she have raised such a hateful boy? He was unnatural. Kreacher had been prepared for this eventuality and had the mistress' handkerchiefs all freshly laundered and pressed.

When Remus read the trial results in the newspaper, he did not know how he should feel. Sirius was thought to kill Peter too? He could be quite impulsive, but … no, maybe he did plan and the recklessness was all an act. James was mentioned in a bad light, however all of Sirius' associates were going to be written about that way.

James had gone home with his parents the day before. He attended the trial with them. They had sat high up in the back. This Sirius Black was a stranger to him. Could he have gotten Peter to leave Hogwarts? Probably, and his recently demonstrated ability to enter the school after expulsion at least proved it was possible. He could have shown up, found Peter, used that stupid portkey story asking Wormtail to help him get out, and then … poor Peter. What had Peter known that made such a terrible thing necessary in Black's eyes?

Lily was saddened by all the terrible things Sirius Black had done. Was this what He Who Must Not Be Named did to people? Or was this the type of person that used He Who Must Not Be Named as an excuse for his own abominable behavior? Helen, Mary and Severus might have been on the side of light, except they had all met Albus Dumbledore. Lily did not know about now. She knew it was the right side, but she could not agree with how they went about things.

Regulus was happy his older brother was going to spend the rest of his life in Azkaban. Sirius had been bullying him before he was even out of the crib. As a boy, Sirius had even 'accidentally' killed Kreacher's father, Beest. He was a really old house elf that had taught Regulus a lot of naughty words. He also applauded Miss Apolline's cunning move to rid herself of the liability. Anyway, if Sirius was a Death Eater, there was no way Regulus would be one, even if that is what his father and uncle wanted. Even if the rumors about the muggle and squib were false, the rampant mayhem that his brother carried on with for the past year was not for someone as civilized as Regulus.

The sudden loss of wages was unexpected by Horace so he contacted a few people he knew and got some other cases moved down the docket so he could get this over with. It was merely a formality, he knew the whole Wizengamot socially after all. Unlike Magical Law Enforcement, Severus Snape would be questioned and forced to tell the truth.

Rita Skeeter had seen the trial and had written a number of accompanying articles expressing what the public wanted to read about. Her curiosity piqued again about the supposed 'pain in the ass', Severus Snape. Had he thwarted earlier plans of Sirius Black? Did he know of a connection not only between Black and He Who Must Not Be Named, but also Black and Dumbledore? How did he feel about Dumbledore's insistence that anything that belonged to Snape was his for the taking? She wrote his solicitor … it appeared Hogwarts' head boy needed to appear as a witness for Horace Slughorn's turn before the Wizengamot.

********************

After their defense group Friday evening, Regulus and Barty wanted to practice questioning Snape. Regulus found the whole idea of Horace Slughorn having to defend himself and his favoritism hilarious. If they could not send him to Azkaban for hurting his mother, he could settle for this. Besides, he did not want his mother questioned about things like that. She was a Black for Merlin's sake. Better to use Snape.

They all knew Horace Slughorn was the head of Slytherin so it was best to rely on unspecific answers. Couldn't say something as absolute as Prof. Slughorn beat me every Friday night, and then have him caught doing it on Saturday morning, or he'd get the whole thing thrown out.

Lily found the whole thing disturbing. She had seen for herself when Sev came out of Slughorn's office. He was not lying. Slughorn really was a terrible person like Sev had told her for years. But why had Slughorn gone to such an extreme? Beating Severus was not going to get gifts or gold from him when he had nothing, and with Slughorn denying that Severus was any good at anything, there would be no bottles or tickets from him once he graduated. Besides, with Severus being a Slytherin, couldn't Slughorn predict that there would be some revenge? Lily suspected that it would not be beneath Sev to get a job mopping floors at St. Mungo's, and lay in wait for however long it took till Slughorn was a patient.

********************

Albus was not getting a good feel for how things were going to go for Horace. Suspecting Horace was going to try to cobble his memories to put together something that was entirely false, Albus would not loan Horace his pensieve to prepare for his trial.

Horace verbally denied he ever touched Severus, but Albus was not sure if he was telling the truth. His old friend was difficult on that. His feelings were very much negative towards that particular student, as they had been for years now, but that did not necessarily mean he physically hurt him or not.

He had tried to contact Barty to clear up the little misunderstanding regarding the abuse allegation from St. Mungo's. Barty had closed it on his own. Albus had told him it was due to someone mixing up the medical records, as Poppy reported, but he had not insisted it be closed. The more recent injuries that St. Mungo's found with the potion spill and the concussion were due to students, not Horace.

Additionally, Albus was concerned he would not be able to work on Dung's appeal for release until he was reinstated on the Wizengamot. Perhaps Severus would simply forgive them like he did with poor Remus Lupin? It was worth a try.

When he reached the fourth floor door to the head boy and head girl's rooms, Albus entered to find guests from all four houses present. Not even restricted to prefects. There was music, food, drink and books. The music stopped along with all the quiet discussion when everyone looked in his direction.

"Good evening," Albus greeted them.

There were muttered replies of 'professor' and 'headmaster'.

Miss Evans was here, but he did not see Mr. Snape, so he asked, "Is Severus in?"

"What for?" Lily asked. Severus could probably hear for himself from his room. He had some arithmancy brainstorm that was occupying him at the moment.

"I want to discuss something with him, Miss Evans."

Lily made a ridiculous face in response, then said, "I'll look." It was obvious she only walked over to the door that was partially open and called, "Sev, the headmaster wants to know if you'll have a word with him out here."

Albus approached the door and corrected Miss Evans, "I meant in private."

"Why?" she asked.

Severus repeated the question, "Why?" He had gotten up to see what Dumbledore wanted now. Did he wheel in an ornate cart laden with everything he needed for his traveling tea party? That might explain the sudden silence.

"Regarding matters we have between us," Albus replied.

"That's entirely your doing. If you chose not to discuss any of it in advance, that's poor planning on your part … sir."

Both Lily and Dumbledore backed up as Severus stepped forward and closed the door to his bedroom behind him. The old man might set his project aflame for kicks. His favorite Gryffindors would have.

"Have I caught you at a bad time?" Albus inquired.

"Any time I see you, it's a bad time."

Albus sighed at the snickering of the other students. "I would like to resolve things, my boy."

"Give me that cup then."

"You know I can't do that."

"I don't believe that."

"It's dangerous."

"It's not so dangerous that I was able to pick it up and hand it to someone else for evaluation. I knew it made some claims that it was the key to power, but maybe that's why it was stolen. Is that what you're going to claim? That I simply possess more willpower than you? That Prof. Sprout has more willpower than you? Go ahead. Being weak-minded and covetous does not excuse stealing."

"You don't understand, Severus."

"I understand you are a self-centered, greedy glutton who wants others to adore you and believe every word you say. I do not believe you. Your actions continually prove to be contrary to your words."

"There's a bigger picture here than just you and me."

"Is it? Because everyone else is dying, while you sit around popping another sweet into your mouth or adding a twelfth lump of sugar to your tea. You were licking sweet cream off your grasping fingers while my mother starved to death because you judged her meaningless. I may be looking at the smaller picture, but I am entitled to think more highly of my mother than you ever did."

"I can understand that you felt your mother's loss at a deep personal level, but there is no need to allow your private feelings to cloud your perceptions."

"That's what the Wizengamot will decide, won't it? It already sent your partner to Azkaban for entering my property without permission, so perhaps my misconceptions are not without merit."

"These actions are only strengthening Voldemort's position."

Severus sneered, "Is that your defense? You stole Helga Hufflepuff's cup because it was He Who Must Not Be Named's key to taking over the world? Is Slughorn too caught up in his own troubles to help you come up with something better?" In his heart, Severus knew Dumbledore was not going to express his real reason, nor what he was going to say to the Wizengamot, because then he could prepare for it. Using the Dark Lord as a reason for Dumbledore to take and horde whatever caught his eye was a flimsy excuse at best. He might convince a few gullible witches and wizards who believed Dumbledore was helping them, but most people would not throw open their homes and vaults to be picked over by this man.

"Prof. Slughorn is not a young man, Mr. Snape."

"I know, he's also dreadfully unfit and gets winded easily by repetitive arm movements. However, since I was a minor at the time, all I did was catch dragonpox. The Ministry handled the rest, and then when Prof. Slughorn chose to exhibit his disciplinary methods to them, they didn't really need me. Any student would do."

"Why are you being so stubborn and unwilling to see my side of things?"

"You are a liar. A phony. A cheat. And a con artist."

"That is not true."

The Ravenclaws and a couple Slytherins smirked at the irony. If one is a liar, what he said was not true. Therefore if the person who never tells the truth says something is not true, than it is.

Severus shrugged at the headmaster. He felt he had made his own position clear. It was Dumbledore that was being stubborn and unwilling to see that if someone holds you accountable for killing his mother that Severus was not going to invite more injury, but was going to fight back. The man's ego was immeasurable.

"An evening's detention for being disrespectful, Mr. Snape."

"Yeah," was all Severus replied with a smirk to goad the old man further. Severus could have asked that house elf to starve Dumbledore to death, but there were witnesses. He also did not suspect that the headmaster would be strolling into that house to loot it. Now he knew better. Dumbledore would get his hands dirty with stealing and killing, rather than advising others to do it or sitting idly by.

********************

Mary and Lily did not share the confrontation with the Gryffindors, but eventually word trickled from other houses about Dumbledore trying to convince Snape to be … more of a Slytherin. Stay quiet. Plan revenge for years. Don't be so hasty. Where had the headmaster been all this time? Severus Snape fought the Marauders tooth and nail. He'd even fight with them when he wasn't their chosen victim. He helped young Ravenclaws in the gents'. He helped harassed Hufflepuffs who were propositioned and had their skirts and robes wrapped around their heads. He may have helped Slytherins, but they did not recount any stories of being embarrassed or rendered helpless by Gryffindors.

Slughorn and Dumbledore were simply bigger bullies. Having that thief sent to Azkaban, followed by a life sentence for Sirius Black, might have the bullies rethinking their strategy of bluffing and blustering their way through a defense. The Wizengamot did not fall for any of that nonsense Sirius Black said.

What Lily wanted to know is why everyone was acting so weird? Why couldn't Dumbledore be more like the headmaster he was in earlier years? Well, not so much cheering the school bullies for being clever boys, but some kind, old man that would protect them? Now he was the enemy, and Severus was not afraid to tell him that. Usually Severus was more cautious, but his mother's death seemed to have pushed him to directly confront Dumbledore and Slughorn. Lily did not count Mundungus Fletcher because neither of them knew who he was.

It was Lily's nights that were sleepless now, while Severus fell asleep quickly beside her.

********************

Horace Slughorn tied up the Wizengamot for days with dozens of character witnesses that swore that Prof. Slughorn was as gentle as a lamb and would never harm anyone.

Everything was going perfectly as far as Horace could tell, but to 95% of the British wizarding population that attended Hogwarts and were never invited to dinner by Horace Slughorn, it appeared to be a circus, including a Miss Rita Skeeter, journalist, who could not get any articles printed in The Daily Prophet at the moment thanks to Barnabus Cuffe, but she did get a nice piece into Witch Weekly that included a witch's viewpoint by including quotes from various witches from around the country, such as Molly Weasley, a young mother who was concerned since her young children would attend Hogwarts.

Finally, the morning arrived that they were going to force that lying louse, Severus Snape, to answer some questions. Horace was looking forward to it immensely. He could collect his lost wages, and perhaps a judgment for slander.

Gumboil had tried to speed through the other 'witnesses' as quickly as possible, but knew he was going to take his time with Snape. Mr. Crouch would be handling Dumbledore, in addition to all his other work. Snape was not listed as a witness, but the same wizards of the Wizengamot would be judging that case. Helping Barty Crouch helped Alastor Gumboil.

Severus entered the court, wearing his Slytherin uniform, head boy badge and also a Wigtown Wanderer pin. He was asked to take a seat in the center and was introduced to the Wizengamot. Horace could not have staged it better himself. Snape had poor posture, scuffed shoes, looked at the floor as he walked with his long, lanky hair hanging over his face, except for that nose, and simply uncomfortable and out of place among the cream of wizarding society. This was someone that looked like a criminal.

Gumboil started, "Mr. Snape, I think we should get a small matter out of the way. You have a criminal record?"

"Yes."

"Underaged wizardy?"

"Yes."

"Please speak louder, if you will … so they can hear you clearly in the back. I was the officer that gave you the warning so will describe what I recall for you to either agree or disagree. Is that alright with you, Mr. Snape?"

"Yes."

"You live in a muggle town. This town was chosen one summer for its lack of wizarding kind and remoteness by Sirius Black, James Potter and Peter Pettigrew for a bit of fun. They were also underaged wizards. As the court already heard during the trial of Sirius Black, they entered and practically demolished a muggle pub. Patrons had been watching a sporting event on the muggle televisions, and your muggle father was among them. He recognized that young men causing the devastation were using wands, and they were able to subdue two of them by taking their wands away. At that time, he asked one of the other fellows to go to his home and request you come to the pub. Correct?"

"I was not there yet, but that is what my father said later."

Gumboil nodded, then continued, "Your father asked you to perform underaged magic to fix things?"

"Yes. I also knew that a muggleborn witch that lived in the same town was given a telephone number for emergencies to contact the Ministry. I felt it was best that the Ministry be contacted as soon as possible because it was too much for me to repair. I could fix tables and chairs easily enough, and once the patrons remaining had someplace to sit, and more pints were served, they seemed willing to wait."

"Did your father strike you to get you to fix the tables and chairs?"

"No."

"Did you tell him it was illegal for you to fix the tables and chairs?"

"Briefly, but I did not want my mother bothered over something like this."

"Why not?"

"She was ill, and had not left the house in years. I did think mother could fix more than me, but once they were willing to wait for the Ministry to sort it out, I saw no reason to suggest getting her there. It was good that I didn't because it the Ministry that figured out that there were pieces of the televisions and other muggle devices missing so they could not be fixed properly in order to work. You did a lot of transfiguration to repair things, and new electronic muggle equipment needed to be purchased."

Horace sighed in impatience. He knew Snape was a criminal. Now everyone else did.

"Shortly after that, you contracted a life-threatening case of the dragonpox, even though you are only a teenage wizard. You were admitted to St. Mungo's. While at St. Mungo's, you were examined. Still being underaged at the time, St. Mungo's filed a complaint with Magical Law Enforcement alleging you were physically abused in the past with more scarring on your body than most of my long-term colleagues in the Auror department display. Were you asked who did that to you?"

"Yes."

"Who did you name?"

"No one."

"Why?"

"I felt it would only make things worse."

"Why's that?"

"People at Hogwarts do as they like."

"They are willing to be punished?"

"No. At that time, no one was punished. It was not until I returned to school that two students were expelled for killing another, but their fellow conspirators were welcome to stay at the school."

"I believe the Wizengamot is familiar with that. So moving on, you felt that with two years remaining at Hogwarts that you would be further punished if you accused anyone of hurting you?"

"I did initially report fellow students, but hardly bothered with that as time went on because there was hardly any punishment and the students responded by escalating their abusive behavior."

"Due to your unusually severe case of dragonpox, to which I note you still have a heavily pockmarked complexion over a year later, St. Mungo's checked on you weekly for a couple months after you returned to school?"

"Yes."

"Were you beaten during that time?"

"No."

"Did St. Mungo's find any new injuries on you?"

"Yes."

"Could you elaborate?"

"I received scalds in Potions class when two cauldrons were overturned on me, and a concussion from a fight that broke out in an upstairs hallway when one a female student was jinxed so her skirt and robe were pulled upward trapping her arms and blinding her."

"Did you jinx the girl?"

"No, I reversed the jinx. She could have fallen."

"You were injured in Potions class while Prof. Slughorn was present?"

"Yes."

"Could you describe what happened?"

"I didn't see most of it because I was concentrating on my potion."

"What you do know may be sufficient."

"I was pushed into my cauldron and the flame beneath it by James Potter. A second cauldron belonging to Sirius Black fell onto my table and additional hot fluid splashed on me. I rolled over on the floor to put out my sleeve that was on fire."

"What did Prof. Slughorn do?"

"He sat at his desk."

"Did he say anything?"

"Yes, he asked me to clean Black's cauldron and awarded him full marks. He excused Potter to go to the Infirmary."

"After you cleaned Black's cauldron, were you excused?"

"No, but the class was let out early."

"Did you go to the Infirmary?"

"Yes."

"Were you treated by the school matron?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"I'm not sure."

"Did she say anything to you?"

"Yes. Potter had been there earlier and said he was the only one hurt."

"Did she examine you?"

"No."

"Are you aware there was a note written by Prof. Slughorn while you were a first year asking the school nurse to deny you medical care?"

"No."

Horace frowned as copies were distributed to the Wizengamot. The original note in Poppy's file and the copy in Snape's file at St. Mungo's had been destroyed. Where did the Ministry find another copy?

"What was your OWL score in Potions?"

"Outstanding."

"You have been attributed with two discoveries in The Practical Potioneer already, before you even sit your NEWT. Are you allowed to work on your own in the potions lab at Hogwarts, like other students do?"

"No."

"Have you asked?"

"Yes."

"You were denied?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"I was not turned down directly. My outside research so far is applying arithmancy to hard to acquire ingredients, or ingredients that would be detrimental to a potion if incorrectly collected. I had requested through my arithmancy instructor, Prof. Abstractus, for the chance to do practical experimentation. He could confirm that my theoretical work was sound."

"Did Atlas Abstractus find your theoretical work so sound that when you were denied the chance to go further, he contacted another Potions Master, other than Horace Slughorn, for a second opinion?"

"Yes."

"If Prof. Abstractus did not have this faith in your skills, do you feel that we would not now know of an easy to produce substitute for rare and legally acquired unicorn lung?"

"I agree with that statement."

Horace rolled his eyes. What did that have to do with this case?

"When your father was killed by Death Eaters, what did you do?"

"Then?" Severus replied.

"Well, yes, when it happened."

"Nothing."

"Why did you do nothing?"

"The Ministry had informed Prof. Dumbledore."

"Did he tell you?"

"About a week later, by then I had already knew and had gone home."

"How did you know?"

"My mother's obituary appeared in The Daily Prophet. It said she was a widow."

"Without your father, your mother could not care for herself?"

"No."

"That was part of my report from the previous summer that was supplied to Hogwarts whenever there's underaged magic used. Did either Prof. Dumbledore or Prof. Slughorn admit they knew that Sirius Black, James Potter and Peter Pettigrew attacked muggles over the summer?"

"Yes."

"Alright. So not until your mother's obituary was in the newspaper … your mother was in Slytherin also?"

"Yes."

"So Prof. Slughorn expressed his condolences, took you home and attended her funeral?"

"No."

"Which of those did he miss?"

"All of them. He never said or did anything."

"I thought we've heard testimony over the almost past week about what a caring man Horace Slughorn is … let me look at my notes … ah yes, goes to funerals, weddings, baby and bridal showers … all the time. A real rock for a person or current student or former student in need. I'm not understanding how you could have not seen Prof. Slughorn … do you know of any other students that received this treatment?"

"Oh yes, Regulus Black's father died soon after my parents. Prof. Slughorn took him home within hours of his death, and may have stayed over a week. Regulus returned before Prof. Slughorn was able to return to school. I can only guess he knew Orion Black closely to be so affected. He even went to the Black home for Easter vacation too, and spent part of the summer there."

There was an outcry from Slughorn while Snape spoke. The Black family was a special case.

"I think you misunderstood my question, Mr. Snape, but I think it's answered. Do you believe Horace Slughorn singled you out for this poor treatment?"

"I don't know."

"Did other students discuss it with you?"

"There would be an occasional joke."

"Such as …?"

"Uh, since I had two parents die, I was allowed to miss two classes of school, or a whole morning. They weren't witty or funny. Not really worth repeating."

"How about the physical injuries?"

"What about them?"

"Was there any discussion about them?"

Severus looked uncomfortable and asked, "You mean like beating the ugly out of me, or because I'm a half-blood that if the bad half was bled out I'd then be a wizard?"

"How often were you injured at Hogwarts?"

"A lot at first. I got better at avoiding it. Hardly any since I had dragonpox."

"Would you say that the incident that was witnessed in the floo was the first time this school year?"

"Yes."

"Would you please review the report from St. Mungo's last September and confirm its accuracy regarding the descriptions of your physical defacement?"

Alastor Gumboil approached with a copy from the top of the stack for the Wizengamot. Severus made a face at it, but took it. He glanced at it, and said, "I guess. I don't spend time looking at my backside in the mirror."

"Let me get these distributed and thank you for your time, Mr. Snape."

"What?" Slughorn yelled, standing. "Why aren't you asking him any real questions?"

"Like what?" Gumboil asked.

"Like get him to say who really hurt him. I never touched him."

"Other than your recent floo call to the Ministry?"

"That was … made up!"

Severus sat where he was, waiting for more questions.

"I'm not following you, Slughorn. You want details of every beating since Mr. Snape entered Hogwarts? He's not the one on trial here. St. Mungo's cataloged the results thoroughly enough that I'm willing to use those. Although he's seventeen now, all this started when he was eleven. That's when you, as his head of house, instructed the school nurse to not provide medical treatment to this particular student."

"No! I don't want any more details than for him to say who did it."

"Mr. Snape already said sometimes students injured him."

"Not that."

"Can I ask for a recess to discuss with Prof. Slughorn what sort of technicality I can provide for him?" Gumboil asked in an exasperated voice.

The wizard currently presiding looked to each side of him before replying, "I do not believe that will be necessary. If I may ask a direct question of Mr. Snape … Prof. Slughorn is suggesting other staff at the school injured you. Have any members of the Hogwarts staff other than Prof. Slughorn injured you, Mr. Snape?"

"No."

Horace exclaimed, "That's not what I meant!"'

"We understand the sort of students Sirius Black and his cronies were, Horace." Looking at the list of prior injuries from St. Mungo's, he admitted, "There's no reason to itemize every scar or burn on Mr. Snape's body."

"How could you believe any of this?" Horace exclaimed. "It's all lies."

"Please be seated, Horace. You are excused, Mr. Snape. Thank you for your time."

Horace glared darkly as Snape got up and walked towards the door with his shoulders hunched and his head down.

Rita had filled up pages with notes and thoughts of possible questions. She could only hope that Severus Snape stuck around long enough till there was a recess. Slughorn kept interrupting proceedings with his views and anecdotes. She hoped the old fool spent a couple years chatting with dementors about his dear favorites, Bella Black and Barnabas Cuffe. The only good thing about Cuffe at the Prophet was that no negative comments were being printed about his mentor, and Slughorn only read the Prophet.

When Slughorn rubbed his hands together and smiled when the council decided to recess before private deliberations, Rita considered carrying sharpened quills to accidentally flick at these sort of proceedings. What did Horace Slughorn know that she didn't? No matter how many people he paraded through here, he had opened a floo to Magical Law Enforcement for them to witness it firsthand. That is what this entire case rested upon. He may know people, he may be slippery, he may like to pull the strings, but Horace Slughand's hands were bloody.

In the lobby of the Ministry, Severus Snape was waiting beside his solicitor on a bench in the corner.

"They've recessed, and will deliberate this afternoon behind closed doors. How do you think it went this morning?" Rita asked.

Severus barely lifted his head to cast his eyes at his solicitor, who could also did some sort of wizarding barrister work too. He was not sure why they were not two separate professions for wizards, or if this fellow hated letting someone else earn his gold.

"I'm not sure I followed the line of questioning entirely, Miss Skeeter. Everything Mr. Snape said was true, just not relevant to this case."

"And how do you feel, Severus?"

He shrugged, then said, "Unsure. Prof. Slughorn knows a lot of people. If the Ministry did not put this case together, I don't think I would have gone forward with it. I live in Great Britain and if I want to work in the field of Potions, I should not be making enemies like this."

"Is that why the questions were intentionally vague?"

"I was not the person asking the questions," Severus reminded her.

"Wouldn't you consider Horace Slughorn your enemy nonetheless? He did injure you."

"I do recognize people that have injured me, such as Horace Slughorn, Sirius Black, James Potter and Albus Dumbledore. However, leaving Hogwarts with a list of enemies to spend my life plotting revenge against them seems unproductive. I can do better things than that with my time."

"If you make a success of yourself, you'll show them, eh?" Rita prompted.

"I suppose."

"If your parents were still alive, that's what they would want. If they were here today, what do you think they'd advise you to do?"

Severus seemed hesitant, then responded, "That was not something they did. Give advice, I mean. My mother would tell me stories about things and tell me what made her happy. I think she gave me direction in that manner. My father … he was more of a leading by example sort, rather than a talker. He did say things, but it was usually to point out that a task got done quicker by doing it, rather than complaining about it. He _did _things, and didn't waste time talking about what he did in the past."

"Sirius Black mentioned your name repeatedly at his trial. Did you thwart his earlier attempts at hurting or possibly killing other students?"

"Besides me? I don't know. He may have talked to his mates James Potter, Remus Lupin and Peter Pettigrew about his plans and how they were progressing, but he did not indicate in front of me what his … ultimate goal was."

"I heard you were present when he reappeared at Hogwarts to celebrate the anniversary of killing Helen Parkin. Were you frightened?"

To Severus, that was a new interpretation of why Black would show up at Hogwarts. He responded, "Yes, actually. I don't know if he saw me so I got behind a sofa and hid. He did something that darkened the room and he was calling for James Potter. At the time, I thought that Potter might have been there with him. Later, I found out he was using the floo in the room to try to contact him."

"How do you think he entered Hogwarts castle?"

"Well … that's certainly been speculated upon. I have no proof, but I think if someone wanted to enter the castle that was not a student, they would need permission from the headmaster."

"Really?" Rita asked.

"It's only a thought. I mean … when we had apparition lessons in the Great Hall, we were told that the headmaster was allowing apparition in the castle for that class just in that location. To me, that means Prof. Dumbledore can allow other areas at other times be accessible by apparition."

"Yes, he could," Rita agreed with a smile. "The headmaster did not say he did that did he?"

"No, I don't think he answered any questions from the students on how Black got in. They are still concerned that anyone can enter the school at any time."

"Especially since Sirius Black associated with Death Eaters. That is very troubling."

"Yes."

"Dumbledore has made other mistakes. We already know about his scheme to leave an unguarded werewolf on the grounds, or just outside the grounds next to Hogsmeade, with no warning to anyone except a small handful of people, who were not the least bit trustworthy. But today … he intentionally withheld information about Death Eaters killing your father. Why do you think he did that?"

"I don't know. My father was a muggle," Severus suggested.

"Mr. Gumboil also pointed out that the school knew your mother was infirmed."

"Yes."

Rita thought for a moment before asked, "So your mother was not someone who would write a letter of complaint to the Board of Governors, the Ministry or the Wizengamot?"

"I do not think she was actively corresponding with anyone. We did not own an owl."

"No owl? And you lived in a muggle town? So there were no holiday gifts sent to the school for your teachers?"

"Definitely not."

"That would all be different now, I suppose. If things had not turned out the way they did. Do you think so?"

"Of course. I realize I would have needed to leave school to care for my mother, and that might have set me back a year from my age group. Between missing a month for dragonpox, and then I guess from February till June. I'm not sure how quickly things would have gone … and I wouldn't want to leave my mother with only house elves, now that I, or we would, have some, but hire some people too."

Rita nodded in understanding, "One cannot measure their wealth in gold alone."

"That's true."

********************

After dinner, Lily knocked on Severus' door. She knew he had gone down to London in the morning, but had not seen him the rest of the day. She had not told Severus anything, but she had her doubts on how things could go. Severus was supposedly only a witness, but with Horace Slughorn, who knew what he was capable of with all his connections.

The door clicked open, and she heard Severus ask, "What is it, Lily?"

She opened the door to look into the dim room and saw Severus was already in bed. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing."

Lily closed the door and got closer. "What are you doing in bed?"

"I didn't feel like doing anything so I went to bed."

"Did it go bad?"

"I don't know."

She sat down next to him and said, "Did they ask you things that uh ... you didn't want to answer?"

"I'm not sure why they asked some things. Like why I did underaged magic to fix things at the pub. About my father and mother dying … what does that have to do with Slughorn?"

Lily's mouth screwed up. Underaged magic … did they want to make Severus out to be some sort of criminal like Sirius Black who needed a good beating? She put her hand on his arm and rubbed it. "So you are going to stay in bed all night?"

"I guess."

"Did you want me to get something for you to eat?"

"No, I'm not hungry."

"What about your homework?"

"I'll do it tomorrow or over the weekend."

"Can I sleep here tonight?"

"If you don't, where would you sleep? Hasn't MacDonald taken over your room?"

"Well … I could use the seventh year room that Mary's not in."

"You can stay here."

"You sure, Sev?"

"Hmm."

"Maybe I'll work on a little Divination so I can catch you up on what you missed tomorrow."

"Alright."

********************

Elphias Doge was pacing about the Hogwarts' headmaster's office as his old friend, Albus Dumbledore, refused to give credence to his suspicions. "Albus, things could have gone much worse for Horace, but I guarantee they did not go as he planned. Ninety days in Azkaban. His supporters were trying to whittle it down, but ninety was as low as … was decent."

"Decent, Dogbreath?"

"That report, Albus. That boy's taken more than a beating. He's been … tortured. If it's not by Horace, than someone. Horace tried to say Black and Potter did all of it, but if that's the case, why didn't Snape say so? Besides, Horace … I don't know what he was thinking with that floo call."

"He got a bit carried away. I'm not entirely sure what he was doing, but Horace was attempting to help me."

"Help you? I mean, of course Horace would help you … and he's normally the cautious sort. Never one to get his own hands dirty. That note to your school nurse I can believe … but then again, why put such a thing in writing? Was this Snape such an uncontrollable monster as a first year?"

"Not at all. He fought but it was with Gryffindors."

"Don't call them that. I'm a Gryffindor. You're a Gryffindor. Sirius Black is …_ not_ a Gryffindor." Turning, he pointed at Albus, "And that's another thing that won't be in your favor, Albus … Sirius Black. This Snape had Black pegged from day one."

"I'm not sure I'd say he was astute. They can't stand the sight of one another."

"Uh … they're different. Snape did mention them today, but only to answer questions directly relating to them and what they did. Black … Black … he'd pin anything he could on Snape. He'd declare that He Who Must Not Be Named is really Snape. That's his answer to anything bad that happened. Snape did it, or he made Black do it."

"No one believes Black."

"So … back to why I'm here. What are you going to do?"

Albus rolled his eyes and chided, "Dodgy Doge ..."

"I'm not interested in buying that stolen cup," Elphias growled.

"Oh, that's not for sale. No, no, I'm going to have to tell the truth."

When he got tired of waiting for it, Elphias urged, "Which is …?"

"I can't tell all the details, but maybe I should let Barty know … considering your high state of agitation. The cup's gone."

"Gone? Someone stole it from you?"

"Oh no, I destroyed it."

Doge's mouth dropped open.

"I hope you'll act properly surprised when I tell this to the Wizengamot."

"Surprised? Surprised? What is wrong with you?"

"I did what needed to be done. Oh that reminds me, uh, how's your Potions? Do you want a teaching position?"

"What? No. Get a potions fellow."

"Don't you remember a single thing you picked up in Egypt?"

"Yeah, camels spit. Seriously, Albus, I don't know if you need to worry about Hogwarts staffing shortages much longer."

Albus waved his hand, "There's no need to get all dramatic."

"No, that's what you're good at. Though that's going to be some show you're going to need to put on. Man, I tell you, you are going to have to outdo your Transfiguration and Charms NEWTs combined."

"Are you ever going to stop raving about them?"

********************

AN: No, Sirius did not kill Orion Black. The grieving Parkin family wanted to ensure Black would be locked up for murder, even if it was one he did not commit. They gambled that murdering another Black might be taken more seriously by the Ministry.


	52. Chapter 52 Great Minds Think Alike

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

**Snape's Worst Memory**

**Chapter 52 Great Minds Think Alike**

"Horcrux?" Barty repeated.

"I'm afraid so."

Crouch's lips twisted to one side in thought, before he said, "I'm aware of what it is, but what makes you so sure? Even for him, that's a dangerous move. Split the soul, split the person … there's always the winning at all costs angle, but if someone's no longer himself hasn't he already lost?"

"You and I understand that, but I really cannot talk about this to anyone else because their understanding is more limited than ours."

"Still Dumbledore," Barty mused while shaking his head, "you have not proved anything. You are not saying you are an expert on horcrux. You no longer have the cup for anyone else to examine. Once you had the cup, you then broke into a house …"

"I had to look for more."

"More? Who would need more than one? To create one is abominable enough."

"You yourself said there was a locket missing, Barty."

"Dumbledore, you are not relying on what you are claiming. If He Who Must Not Be Named took these items years ago, why would he need to make two horcrux? Secondly, why would he give them both to the Lestrange family to show off? Snape said he saw this cup out in the open. Anyone who looked at it knew it did not belong in that house."

"Huh … I suppose that's true. Tom would not put both of them in the same place."

"He could be wearing it for all we know."

"True. True … but for him to simply give it to one of the Lestranges for safe keeping leads me to believe that he did not have to be careful with that cup because there were more."

"Now you are speaking nonsense. If a wizard created more than one horcrux, there would be nothing left of him. Half goes into the first object, half goes into the second object, then poof ..."

"I don't think so. I think it's half, then half of the half, then half of what remained each time."

"Each time?" Barty exclaimed. "How can someone get along with a quarter or an eighth of their soul?"

Albus shrugged, "Tom does not value the things you and I do, Barty."

"Value? A soul is beyond value, Dumbledore. We are all just lumps of flesh without it. Splitting it or diluting it … how many books of Dark Arts warn of that very thing?"

***********************

Lily saw ninety days in the newspaper and was outraged. If Slughorn could do as he liked, then what would they bother doing to Dumbledore? On top of that, Severus acted like he didn't care, but she knew he did. He wouldn't be so lackadaisical lately with hardly working on his extra arithmancy project and spending so much time lying in bed.

Severus, on the other hand, thought ninety days and no longer teaching at Hogwarts was fine. Slughorn only had one commodity and that was his reputation with being able to grant favors. Would he be invited to as many dinners and parties next holiday season, after only having prison guards and dementors to share this one?

When that Skeeter woman tracked him down on a Hogsmeade Saturday, Severus responded to her, "I have never been to Azkaban or been in the presence of a dementor. It's supposed to be horrible. The Wizengamot knows better than I if their sentence is appropriate."

He was not going to say the Wizengamot was composed of toothless and doddering old fools when their leader was about to be tried.

Regulus found Slughorn's fall satisfying. A longer prison sentence would have been nice, but he'd only have gotten something like that if someone important like his mother told her story. However, real Blacks did not tell their stories … Sirius was disinherited so his mouth was probably still going in Azkaban while he complained about his bed, food and laundry service.

***********************

The truth was there was no laundry service at Azkaban. No one had brought Sirius a change of clothes or even underwear or socks. The only rest his clothes got was when he was a dog. The dementors did not care, and Sirius found it more pleasant to be a dog around them. Dogs were so upbeat that even a dementor was ineffective against them.

Sirius could not think as well as a dog, but he could remember Snape. How did Snape manage all that? He understood how people could get mixed up on the werewolf thing because Sirius did not expect Remus to take the blame. But all that other stuff about Wormtail, his father, and Apolline? How did Snape get to Apolline? The dog's eyebrows shot up … Apolline! Snape probably gave her something and wanted her for himself. Snape was a jealous troll that belonged under a bridge where no one could see how ugly he was. The exact opposite of Apolline.

Ugh, that smell. Dinner. There was barely enough here to fill the belly of a teacup poodle, much less his.

Yes, only he, Sirius Black, could save Apolline because Snape somehow fooled everyone else. He had to get out of here.

***********************

Barty had found the _expecto patronum_ spell, but had not been able to get it to work on his own. He brought the book with him to their defense study group for the rest to look over. No one got even a little silver mist. There must be something more to it than thinking of something happy, and following these instructions.

Lily was frustrated with this stupid patronus spell. The book had to be wrong. She also had doubts about Severus being able to cast it at all. Something happy? Besides Lily, what else did Sev have? At times, his pessimism got so bad he did not seem happy with her either.

The reality was Severus was not happy with MacDonald and Wilkes living in the head girl's room, anyone that Lily felt like inviting had an open invitation to hang out in their common room, and her constant pestering to ask him if something was wrong. Did he have to say it every day? If Lily did not hear his response the first or second time, then why bother?

***********************

Alastor Gumboil had sensed the change in Mr. Crouch's approach to this case. His work on the Slughorn case, making Snape to seem like the victim of multiple people to the Wizengamot, including a careless Dumbledore who did not care if Snape's mother lived or died, seemed wasted. What had discussed between Dumbledore and Crouch? Mr. Crouch was above bribery or coercion, so there must have been some fact that needed to remain hidden.

Barty had given the horcrux explanation some thought. He believed Dumbledore thought the cup was a horcrux. Even someone who could be as frivolous as Albus Dumbledore would not joke about horcrux. He was right that no risks should be allowed, however, Dumbledore was always doing things _his _way. Not the right way. That's what was so blasted annoying! Stealing, breaking into others' property with the intent of taking more, not trusting someone like Barty to take a look at the cup before destroying it, and there was also Dumbledore's odd declaration in the newspaper announcing he had the cup. Why let You Know Who know that he had it in his possession? If Dumbledore thought him capable of creating multiple horcrux, did he want him to make another? Was that Dumbledore's plan, even though he denied Barty's assertation that only a limited number of horcrux could be made from one soul? He Who Must Not Be Named gets tricked into making another and then that would be the end of him? Some soul-tearing suicide, but then the horcrux would still exist or be destroyed? Dumbledore did not give everything the proper thought. He just went off and did things like a blasted, bloody Gryffindor.

Albus Dumbledore's case went as most people felt it should. First off, they could not send Dumbledore to Azkaban because if they did, who would stop He Who Must Not Be Named?

Secondly, even though Dumbledore was one of the greatest wizards ever, he was humble enough to admit he made a mistake. He had misunderstood what Snape was doing with the cup, and when he had confiscated it, noticed it was cursed. Probably by those horrible Lestranges because Helga Hufflepuff's cup would not be a cursed object. So naturally, Dumbledore wanted to remove the curse and even one as wise as him can make an error. Sadly, the cup was destroyed. Those Lestranges really were horrible people.

And finally, because the Lestranges were such horrible people, Dumbledore was worried about what else they could have at their house so went there to take a look around since Hogwarts' head boy, Severus Snape, had had so many terrible things happen to him already.

Severus had not been at the court to see for himself how Dumbledore grinned as he explained whatever to his forgiving peers. Did they just stand around joking and giving each other knowing winks because they would never punish one of their own? The obscene amount of money that was transferred to the Snape vault, along with the letter from his solicitor stating the much greater amount awarded to the rightful owners, the Smith family, did have Severus wondering how much Dumbledore must have to simply piss it away like this. The old man would not agree to an amount that he could not easily pay. Was this his way of showing off?

There were others, including Aberforth and Voldemort, who saw this as Albus Dumbledore's insatiable need for attention with all the flair of a barker for a freak show on a carnival midway. He had nothing of true interest to show people, but it was all about tricking them into lining up to believe him. Meanwhile, Dark Marks continued to be still seen above smoking ruins of former houses containing the remains of the family that used to live there.

***********************

Severus solved two problems with one solution. His equations on phoenix tears stalled because he was missing something intrinsically magical about them that needed to be included. He consulted Prof. Abstractus and was allowed to look in the restricted section of the library when the professor accompanied him.

That also meant Severus got to spend more time in the library and outside the heads' rooms without Lily and all her guests. Friday evenings is what Severus initially agreed to for defense study. Then Saturday to allow Gryffindors in for an hour for arithmancy as long as they kept things neat. After that, MacDonald visited frequently before moving in, then Wilkes moved in. On any evening or all-day Saturday or all-day Sunday, there were normally at least a dozen or so students that stopped by on their way to or from the library. The Slytherin common room was quieter.

Unlike everyone else, Severus also knew how Sirius Black got into the castle. However, he did not mind keeping the rumors of Death Eaters showing up at any time simmering because it appeared that the headmaster did nothing about it, and no one had heard Dumbledore state the problem was solved.

Lily was not sure what was bothering Severus. He hardly said anything. Sirius Black was in prison where he belonged. Slughorn seemed to have too many connections for anything serious to happen, and Dumbledore was a joke.

She finally had some good news for him. Sev got back late from wherever he had been. He came back with a bunch of parchment filled with scribbles. While he was putting it on his desk in his room, Lily asked, "Guess what, Sev?"

"What?"

"Mary and Malcolm might be getting married."

Severus gave Lily a strange look and answered, "Alright." He did not know why she sounded happy and excited. MacDonald and Wilkes were their age and still in school, and there was a whole world of better witches and wizards for them to meet out there. Or was that only for Lily?

"Isn't that great?" Lily prompted.

"If you say so," Severus replied, heading into the bathroom.

Lily followed questioning, "What do you mean by that?"

"Exactly what I said. It does not matter to me."

Turning the chamomile tap that he forgot, Lily said, "Of course it matters to you, Sev. They're your friends."

"Not so. MacDonald is your friend," Severus clarified. "I've already told you I do not have friends in Slytherin."

"Come on, Sev, I've seen a lot of them talking to you."

"For either homework, some reason to talk to the head boy, or because I am considered to have a fortune in galleons and property."

"Do you?"

"I don't know. I haven't counted or inventoried anything. Did you want a copy when I do?"

"Well how does anyone know how much you inherited? Did those people say how much they had?"

"I don't know. They didn't talk to me. They were related to Black."

Lily rolled her eyes. Sirius Black was proud of being a Black when it meant he was wealthy, he didn't care much for his relatives. Lily wouldn't know anything about them if he didn't talk about them so much. And Potter was worse. He was related to some other old family whose last name began with a 'P'. And not Prince. That was Sev's mum's family. She remembered that when they played something and Lily wanted a Prince. Sev claimed he was one, but he admitted why he said that. He didn't want Lily to think he was a liar, just a play on words.

She didn't think Severus was much like any of those other people with their claims about their families and fortunes. He still bought just ink, quills and parchment in Hogsmeade. The only thing that seemed to benefit from the alleged Lestrange fortune was Phi, besides Albus Dumbledore. If Severus really had a fortune, he'd do something with it. He hadn't even bought her a gift.

When Severus did not say anything else, Lily restarted their conversation while they bathed. "So what are you planning on doing?"

"About what?"

"Whatever you inherited."

"There's a list of properties. I was going to look at them over the holiday. I can't stay at Spinner's End because I did not buy a furnace? Is that the right word with all the pipes for that sort of plumbing, besides water for sinks? I still have the stove there and can buy coal for it, if this list is a bunch of remote shacks."

"The holiday?" Lily objected. She was amused that Severus would not care if it was a couple of shacks. "No, you're staying at my house."

"Why?"

"You just said that Spinner's End doesn't have proper heat, and mum and I want you to have a proper Christmas."

Severus made a face and commented, "Do I have to? I don't like Christmas."

"That's because this place is full of toerags." Lily felt it figured that people like Slughorn and Dumbledore would make people hate Christmas. "We don't have food with glitter in it, and I already told mum that you don't like anything with suet."

"Why don't the two of you visit Petunia?"

"Ugh."

"What's wrong with your sister now?"

"Nothing. Just that she'll make a big deal over it."

"You make a big deal over Christmas so isn't that compatible?"

"No. She'll have … no, I want to be home with our stuff. We have decorations and ornaments from when I was a child. That's what I want."

"What do you need me for then?" Severus had not been involved with Christmas at the Evans as a child. When it came to Christmas, not much could beat the constant nauseating display that Hogwarts turned into with trees, lights, fairies and snow falling all over indoors. From what he understood, most of the students were heathens like him.

"Because it's Christmas."

"December 25th will still occur without me. It has my entire life, and even before that."

Lily made a face back at Severus. She couldn't tell if he was simply in a bad mood this evening, or if it was all this trouble with Dumbledore, Slughorn and Sirius Black.

***********************

AN: The chapter title is due to both Aberforth and Voldemort reaching the same conclusion over Albus' trial.

AN: Zacharius Smith wealthy and able to afford a Firebolt? LOL

AN: JKR on Veritaserum and why it is not used for wizarding trials : .com/textonly/en/faq_?id=105


	53. Chapter 53 Silver Bells

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

**Snape's Worst Memory**

**Chapter 53 Silver Bells**

Lily knew something was wrong with Sev, but couldn't put her finger on it. They were sharing a bedroom, taking baths together and shagging at least once a day. Was he getting bored with her? He hardly said anything, even when she asked him. He was back to working on his arithmancy project.

He finally agreed to stay overnight at her house in their guest room over the holiday. She did not want him sleeping anywhere with those horrible house elves lurking about. Even though Lily had only seen the one those two times, it was like an entirely different species from what was down in the Hogwarts kitchens. Maybe Sev could do that spell that stuck their tongues to the roof of their mouths.

When Lily suggested that after their last defense study group before the holiday they spend the entire weekend in bed, Severus asked, "Don't you have guests to entertain, Lily?"

"Mary and Malcolm are going to be busy also, and whoever answers our outside door will be responsible for entertaining whoever shows up."

"You already planned it with them?"

"Not exactly planned, Sev."

"I have time scheduled with Prof. Abstractus in the restricted section this weekend."

Lily frowned but answered, "Alright."

She picked up that Severus mentioned all their friends that dropped by over a weekend to see them. Their common room was quiet, clean and serious schoolwork could get done here without the noise restrictions of the library. He had mentioned something before about not liking too students in their rooms, but it was hard to predict if they'd be left alone, or a dozen would show up simultaneously. Sev couldn't blame her for that.

Besides, Lily was offering not to let anyone in, but Sev preferred to hang out in the restricted section … wait, yeah, Sev would prefer to get his hands on books in the restricted section. It was a good thing that Prof. Abstractus limited how often Severus could be in there. For a barmy looking guy covered in chalk dust, Abstractus was different than other teachers at Hogwarts.

None of Lily's teachers let her in the restricted section, and she was head girl now. Was it because she did not excel in one area to get special attention? Lily felt Charms was her strong point, but she did not do the kind of thing Sev did with charms. How did he make up new spells or adapt other ones? He also knew a lot more spells than Lily from all that reading he did. Her last school year was almost half over, and perhaps she was wasting her opportunity to learn more. Severus did not mind sharing what he learned when no one was around to overhear them. Lily could not learn when Sev was sorting out an idiot because he was pretty good at nonverbal spells.

* * *

Remus' mother answered the door and let James in.

"Hey Moony!"

Remus came into the parlor and asked, "Prongs, what are you doing here?"

"I got a chaser position with the Braga Broomfleet. We'll leave after Boxing Day."

"Braga Broomfleet?" Remus repeated. It sounded sort of familiar, but he couldn't remember where they were.

"Portugal, Moony," James replied excitedly. "Get ready for all those hermosa senoritas."

"Portugal … and isn't senorita Spanish?"

James waved his hand dismissively, "They'll know what I mean."

"You don't speak Portuguese or Spanish, Prongs."

"That's a bonus. Don't you see, I won't have to listen to their coach's nagging because I don't habla. Besides Braga has good beaters. They're chasers are rubbish so anything they tell me could actually hurt my performance."

Remus' mouth opened in disbelief. What if the other chasers understood enough English to understand James? Also, ignoring a coach was a sure way to get kicked off a team. This was professional quidditch, not the house team.

"I don't know, Prongs. Portugal's far away."

"It's just a portkey, Moony."

"Your parents are alright with this?"

"What do you mean? I'm seventeen, and I have to go where my career takes me."

Remus did not think playing for the Chudley Cannons for a few months amounted to a career as a professional quidditch player. If James got himself tossed off another team, where would he go next? "I'm going to have to give this some thought."

"Thought? What's there to think about, Moony? You going to sit around here at your parents feeling sorry for yourself?"

"That's uncalled for, James. I'm not as bold as you, but I have to think about things you don't."

"Oh that. Don't worry about it."

"Someone is dead because no one worried about it."

"That was over a year ago, Remus. Don't let it keep dragging you down. It's holding you back. Come with me to Portugal. I got some leads on some villas. That'll be good for parties and when you need it, you can be separated and kept safe. Alright?"

"I'm still going to have to think about it, James."

If James Potter had not spent all that money getting her Remus out of prison, Mrs. Lupin would have a few words on thinking for him. Villas, parties and senoritas … that boy was a complete and spoiled ass.

* * *

Lily was not pleased that Summerby showed off at defense group by getting a bit of silver stuff to come out her wand when she tried that _patronus _charm. Why her? She only joined the group last month. Summerby wasn't even testing this year because she was in sixth. She didn't have to take Crouch seriously that they should all keep trying on their own. The only funny thing about it was that Crouch demanded to know everything she had done, right down to what she had for dinner tonight.

Afterwards, Lily kidded Severus, "So what do you think about Crouch tonight? Upset that a Hufflepuff beat him."

"Beat him? I doubt Summerby could beat Crouch in a duel."

"Not a duel, but at doing that spell."

"That spell only works for a dementor. If the dementors left Azkaban, the Ministry would work on getting them rounded up or rid of them."

"Oh, you're standing behind the Ministry for once, Sev?"

"They're dementors, Lily. Sucking out people's souls is irreversible. They're as good as dead once that happens. I don't think they're particular either so they might attack muggles."

"So why do you think Summerby got it? Do you think someone helped her?"

"Supposedly we know everything we need to know to cast it. It'll take practice. _Patronus _is not an easy charm. That's why it's worth extra on the test."

"It's supposed to be an animal, not that silver ooze."

"Lily, that silver ooze is better than what any of us can do."

She huffed and went into the bathroom, then stuck her head back out, "Any particular scent tonight?"

"Oh … uh, not anything too strong. Stay away from the rose and jasmine. I don't even know why they are on my tub."

"I'm not going to put any lavender or chamomile in because I don't want you falling asleep on me, Sev."

Severus did not reply as to how unlikely that was, but checked Phi's things and brought her in from the common room window. He hurried since if Lily got through washing herself then she insisted on washing him. When she did, only one part of him got washed really well, and everything else was ignored. Severus did not mind washing Lily's body or hair, but when it came to her reciprocating she did a horrible job. Maybe because he considered a bathtub as a luxury and wanted to actually use it to bathe.

He was too late. Lily was waiting to soap up his cock. Within a minute of sitting in the tub, Severus was hard enough for Lily to straddle him. Perhaps she enjoyed bathtub sex more because the water diluted her lubrication, making it hard for her to impale herself immediately. Lily had to work at getting the length of him into her, until he grabbed her bum and thrust his hips at the same time. She rewarded Severus with a gasp and grabbed the back of his head burying his face in her breasts.

In a short while, Lily began moving against him so he was able to get his face turned to one side without her protesting. For Severus, it was still shagging with everything that went with it. Lily yelling, cooing and grunting, soft, big tits, his cock sliding in and out of Lily's pussy, and his hands full wherever he chose to put them.

Severus chose to shag Lily rotten in the bath so he could get a chance to finish bathing before bed. He'd only get dirty again, but at some point this weekend he wanted to be completely washed. He took advantage of her coming again to shift Lily off of him, and guided her to lean against the side of the tub so he could take her hard from behind while having a hand between her legs stimulating her and the other working on twisting her nipples. There was no mystery left to what Lily enjoyed.

He might have done too good a job because Lily crawled out of the tub for a towel before retreating to the bedroom. She promised to wait for him in bed so when he came out, Severus asked if it was alright to put on his potion for pockmarks. Lily had skipped it so asked him to bring it over so they could rub it on each other.

Lily had very little left of her dragonpox, unlike Severus. He was doubting his appearance would improve any more. Not that he had any looks before.

They lay down and spooned together to shag before falling asleep. Severus woke a few hours later to find Lily staring at his face.

"What?" he asked.

"Nothing." Lily had woken to find Severus dreaming again. She thought he said 'mother', but had not been sure.

Severus did not know what Lily was up to now. The lights were lit. Was she studying how repulsive he was? He had always been hideous, but his looks were worsening with age, not improving. Lily embraced him, rather than grabbing his cock. He asked, "What's wrong?"

"Nothing, Sev," Lily said while beginning to kiss him, working her tongue between his lips.

Thinking while allowing Lily to progressively move towards another round of love making, Severus continued to suspect that there was something fundamentally wrong with him. He did not dislike sex, but with Lily his expectation had been that it should be something beautiful between them. He knew the source of that misconception came from his mother. That was not a good source of information. Mother was totally wrong about Hogwarts, and she was barking mad for loving his father. There was nothing beautiful between mother and father. He was living proof of how ugly they were.

Severus was still sure he loved Lily, but not in an unconditional manner. He liked looking at her, seeing her happy and she was the only person he wanted touching him. However, Lily could be aggravating too. She made decisions that effected both of them without any discussion, or she'd ask him about something and not accept his answer. Either telling him that he was wrong, or ignoring his reply and repeatedly asking him the same question. Was it some game with her to ask with the conviction that he'd finally agree with her, and stop pestering him with the same inquiry?

Look at MacDonald and Wilkes. They lived in the head girl's room. He did not agree to that. Though it was Lily's room, he had never said that Lily could stay in his room every night. Lily even stayed in here on the nights of the full moon, when Wilkes was sleeping in the dungeons. If Severus did have some say in things, it would have been more convenient for MacDonald and Wilkes to stay in the head boy room, since Lily's room had windows for his familiar.

* * *

Prof. Abstractus was careful what texts his student viewed. Some of the tomes in the restricted section would be better off destroyed. Fortunately, Snape's current direction had nothing to do with unicorns. How wizards ever could think of carving that beautiful creature into so many bits for their benefit was monstrous. Phoenixes could also be chopped up like a chicken at the butcher shop. Even with their regenerative powers, they could not be considered living after some of these harvesting methods. There were even cruel methods to induce a phoenix to have constantly tearing eyes. The resulting blindness was mentioned in passing, but whoever thought to place these noxious fuming concoctions under the poor creature's perch would hardly ever risk letting it fly again.

Severus could not find enough on what phoenix tears were composed of, so moved his line of research into more sophisticated ways of detecting it through his own distillation. There was also a possibility that St. Mungo's library would have better information.

His disappointment grew when he inquired of Lily whether she was in contact with Healer Pye still. Apparently, Lily had not bothered to write her after his suggestion that she would know healers looking for apprentices and may give Lily honest advice.

"Why, Sev?"

"Forget it."

"What's got you annoyed now?"

"If you wait to write, she may think you are only using her to obtain an apprenticeship."

"Isn't that what I'm doing?"

"You could have written with some questions about the field to show that you have a genuine interest in healing people."

"I got plenty of time left to do that. Besides, unlike you, I need to get my NEWT grades first."

"Me? What do I have to do with your apprenticeship?"

"Nothing."

"No, you wouldn't have said it if you truly meant nothing. Are you asking me to buy your apprenticeship?"

"What?"

"Buy it with money. You know I got the Lestrange money, and rather than writing a couple letters to find someone that is interested in teaching you … what is it you'd prefer? I find some mediocre healer that is desperate for money, no matter what your skills or interests are?"

"No, I didn't mean that. And I don't want to get stuck with some money-grubbing moron that can hardly take a temperature."

"What do you mean by 'unlike you'?"

"You've already gotten published so they don't care what your grades are."

"Who's they?"

"That bloke that wrote you the letter," Lily said, pointing towards Severus' desk.

"I haven't interviewed that fellow yet. He's still young, and has not published, so I don't know what direction his independent work is taking. It may be something I'm not interested in, or he has no ambition of his own, and wants to use me in some way."

"Why do you even need an apprenticeship, Sev?"

"That's the way things are done. I cannot certify myself as a potions master."

Lily crossed her arms over her chest, and muttered, "They'll probably hold you back, rather than let you become one of the youngest potions masters ever. There's that thing with Slughorn."

"Not everyone got chummy with him, and now it's alright to not go along with him openly."

"Well, still … you got a letter from someone, even if he's not so good. I didn't get any."

"How many people other than me, and maybe McGonagall, even know you want to be a healer?"

"Mary does."

"I meant professionally. People that are in the position to recommend you."

"I told them at St. Mungo's when we were there."

"And they haven't heard from you since your last check-up. That's why I told you to start writing."

Lily sighed and complained, "What's the rush anyway? Maybe I'd like to take some time off."

"Were you planning on doing nothing or something definite?" Severus asked, fishing for information. Was Lily already looking forward to life without him? After they graduated, she could take that five thousand galleons and spend her time meeting and shagging wizards, as she originally planned without the burden of also being apprenticed.

"I don't know. Might spend some time with mum. Visit Tunie. Travel."

If Lily had already looked through his mail to know he had an offer of an apprenticeship, when was she going to say something to let him know? Maybe that had been her intention. Severus obligated under an apprenticeship contract, while Lily made her plans without ever saying anything.

She would not even have to feel any remorse about dragging this out for so long. Lily knew how repulsive Severus was, but now he was a wealthy repulsive. Unfortunately, he was not attracted to anyone but Lily. Even witches that were not insulting him were annoying.

* * *

Lily noticed on the train that Severus was actually responding to people. Mostly Summerby. She shouldn't even be in their compartment because she was not a prefect, but then Lily would have to ask Regulus Black to leave too. They were talking about history with Crouch. None of it was part of Prof. Binns' curriculum.

She could not help smirking when Summerby asked Severus about writing over the holiday once they disembarked from the train, and Sev replied he didn't have an owl. It was true, and a bit presumptuous for people to expect everyone to have an owl. Maybe she'd get the subtle clue that Sev did not live near wizards to use a post office and stop talking to him. If Severus really wanted to write Summerby, he could apparate to a wizarding post office.

Mum was happy to see them when they apprated to the Evans' backyard. She asked Severus a lot of questions about Christmas at the Snapes, even though he kept saying the Snapes did not have any holiday celebrations. No tree, no lights, no decorations, no singing and no special food.

Lily stood in the parlor and then asked, "Where's our tree?"

"I waited for the two of you. Why would I go pick out a tree without you?"

"You have before," Lily replied.

"Your father and Petunia were home. We can go this afternoon if you're so impatient, Lily. I haven't gotten the decorations out of the attic yet either. Maybe you can get to work on that while I help Severus settle in?"

"Settle in? What do you mean? He knows where everything is already, mum."

"Maybe something has changed," Severus commented. Why was Lily starting trouble with her mother? They had been here less than ten minutes. If Lily did not want to be here, she could have come up with some story to tell her mother. And why would she want him here to watch this?

Lily followed behind them to the Evans' guest bedroom. Severus did not see anything different than he had seen before.

"Can I get whatever you need from the attic, Mrs. Evans?"

"You, Severus?"

"Unless you don't want me to," he responded.

"Lily …?"

"He can handle it, mum."

"I didn't mean that he couldn't, Lily. Show him where. Thank you, Severus."

Lily made a face then said, "Come on. You haven't seen the attic."

"I've seen the stairs before. Not where they go."

"The boxes are marked," Lily explained as she led Severus upstairs. "These ones here."

"Just these?"

"Yeah, if you miss anything, we'll notice."

"Alright. Take them all down to the first floor?"

"Yeah, but leave the spot where we put the tree open."

"Is it in the same place every year?"

"You know where?"

"I've seen it from outside, next to the window."

"OK, I'm going to help mum."

Mrs. Evans asked her daughter, "You left Severus upstairs on his own?"

"Yeah, he can handle a few boxes, mum."

Later, Severus was unable to stay at the house while they went to procure a tree. He did not argue since he remembered Petunia would not like him alone in their house, and Mrs. Evans might feel the same way. He offered to go over to Spinner's End to check his house, but they insisted that he come to help them choose a tree. It did not make sense. They could see trees as well as he could.

Lily was steadfast on her choice of tree. No one needed him to go along. The fellows selling them even tied it to the roof of the car for Mrs. Evans. He didn't even have to touch it once he convinced the ladies to wait a couple hours till it was dark.

Once the bloody wide, once-living tree was inside, Severus did not understand how they positioned the uneven base of the trunk in the little metal stand without magic. The large pan of water underneath for it made this whole exercise seem pointless. Mrs. Evans related some memories of trees tipping over in the past. Why did muggles put breakable objects on their trees to have them fall over?

After dinner, Severus was not excused from the fuss over the tree and all this … stuff that Lily and her mother wanted all over their house. They each would hand him something, tell him what to do with it, but differed on what happened next. Lily would verbally tell him he was doing it wrong and ask him to move it, move it, move it a little more, higher, lower, to the right, to the left and then nod. He caught Mrs. Evans moving items he placed for her when she thought he didn't see her. Why were they wasting his time on this nonsense? He didn't care where their items were supposed to go. If they went in the same spots every year, why did they need him? He may be taller, but Lily could use magic to reach anything that went up high.

It was a mistake letting Lily talk him into staying here. He should have considered that prior to this, the closest he got to seeing Christmas in this house was from outside when he was young. That's when Severus had been sad that Lily could not play outside because it was too cold. He could meet her on her walk home from school, but there were Saturdays, Sundays and holidays when he didn't get to talk to her. Severus could still see her. Lily's family went out every Sunday morning at the same time. He could also see in the windows when it was lit inside their house. The lights on the tree were pretty from outside. Not having been to Hogwarts with a dozen trees, he naively enjoyed the display. Severus also fantasized about being invited inside Lily's house. It would be nice and warm, with hot drinks and food. Lily told him later about the music, special food and presents. Severus was not sure what he would receive as a present. Lily got toys and clothes. Severus would prefer some clothing, but this Santa Claus fellow had never found his house. That was another reason he wanted to go to Lily's house for Christmas. If Petunia was good enough to get presents, he should get at least one, if he could be somewhere that Santa Claus knew how to get to.

Severus found out at Hogwarts that Santa Claus was a fiction that parents told their children. He had been quite upset that first year when everyone that was at Hogwarts got presents. Severus had gotten one from Lily before she left, so he rushed to make her something and used a school owl to send it to her. He had spent a lot of time thinking about Lily saying bad children got nothing. Then his theory was ruined because other Slytherins who read Dark Arts books received nice presents, and Potter and Black came back to school boasting about all their gifts.

Spending one Christmas holiday at the Evans' house could not be as bad as that first year at Hogwarts.

* * *

Remus had been nervous. His parents were with him. The students had left for home. Back at Hogwarts. Prof. Dumbledore made it sound simple. Prof. McGonagall had a lot more to say about it.

Now he had to tell James.

Remus had flooed to the Potters' alone.

"Hey, Moony."

"Prongs … uh, hi."

"All set? You know it's warmer in Portugal."

"Yeah, uh … I thought it over. I'm going to stay here."

"Stay here? What for?"

"My parents … and me think that maybe I should stick to serious things. Like school."

"School? What do you need with that?"

"I … um, can see your point sort of, with uh my condition, but I want to take my NEWTs."

"NEWTs? Oh Moony, don't go soft on me."

"It's not soft. I … I see it as a step forward with my life."

"So you're just going to stay home and have your parents teach you?"

"Well, no. I mean I'm sure they could, but I got permission to go back to Hogwarts. I'll be back in sixth year in January."

"Hogwarts?"

"Yeah, well … MacDonald gets locked up in the dungeons with house elves, ghosts and a teacher keeping an eye on her so uh ... I'm going to do that too."

"Ugh, MacDonald? And sent back to sixth year? No. Why would you do that to yourself, Remus?"

"I want to give it a try. I like living with you too, James, but … I don't know."

"We have a great time, don't we?"

"We do, but not everything is about having a great time, Prongs."

* * *

Severus figured out what the problem was with the Lestrange house elves, or at least why they were so numerous. They were fucking each other all over the house. They did not care if he saw them. There were too many. They did not have to spend much time cleaning because they were everywhere. They did not have enough space to live out of sight in the kitchen, attics and under the stairs. They also had access to his money to procure food to eat, and from what he saw in the kitchen, they ate better than he did at Spinner's End.

The house elves did not respond well to questioning about their former masters. From what Severus could see, they were not in the middle of anything at all. They merely sat around every day plotting against muggles and muggleborns and watching their house elves screw? Is that the sort of wizard and witch that had time to appreciate He Who Must Not Be Named's words about their destiny to rule over everyone else? The idle wealthy who did not do anything other than give orders? Like Lestrange, Potter and Black. Or the unemployed, miserable purebloods who wished they had this sort of wealth, rather than applying themselves at Hogwarts and then finding employment? Like Mulciber and Avery. In the Dark Lord's utopia, who would do the work if they got rid of all the mudbloods and blood traitors? Seemed like piss-poor planning, unless this house elf breeding program was their answer to that problem.

He did not like the house, or the other properties, but found a lot of books worth looking through. He set the house elves to packing up all the books first. Severus would choose other things worth keeping once they were done with those. Lily and her mother did not want him leaving their house again till after Christmas. He'd be fortunate if he could get out to post letters.

Lily and Mrs. Evans realized that Severus had no Christmas spirit. Mrs. Evans felt his parents had done a poor job in another area of his life. Lily felt that Hogwarts was probably a big part of it too. Sev had seemed interested in the holiday when she told him about it before they went to school. Maybe he was only being polite since Lily listened to everything he had to say about wizards and Hogwarts back then.

Severus was not moody or sulking, just not particularly interested in watching the television shows, listening to Christmas music, spending long periods of time doing holiday activities, or ecstatic over the food. He was attempting to be polite, while asking to be excused when his capacity for long-term cheeriness reached its end. Severus knew Lily and her mother were lonely with both Mr. Evans and Petunia missing. Though there was a bonus to staying here. He could either watch the whole game or see the highlights on the sporting news from the Manchester matches.

He was disappointed when he found out that he could not sell off the excess house elves. Severus could give them as gifts or have the Ministry do some sort of reassignment. If he received one of the foul-mouthed, pointy-toothed things as a gift, he would not appreciate it.

* * *

On Christmas morning, Lily was disappointed in a way. Severus did not make her gift, but bought her a green jade necklace and bracelet. There was also no ring. Not that Lily should expect a special ring out of the blue from Severus since they had last discussed months ago that she was not sure she wanted to marry him, but she would have enjoyed the surprise, or the thought, or even the reminder that Severus felt that way about her.

Her mum got a really smart watch from Severus. It was similar to her good watch, but it had a fancy magically-adjusting, gold chain, rather than a leather wristband.

Sev appeared pleased with his gifts, but then mum started hissing at Lily in the kitchen that he spent too much on them. Lily explained to her mum that he had inherited more money, and if they hadn't given him new socks and a couple of jumpers, it was unlikely Severus would buy them for himself. Sev did not fake being happy so if he was upset, he would have at least acted cranky towards them instead of letting mum suggest another pot of tea. He was still downstairs instead of retreating from the nonstop carols playing on the stereo. That was a sure sign Sev was willing to go along with Christmas morning traditions in the Evans' house.

After lunch, Lily saw Mary's owl outside the window and let her in. Rather than carrying a return present from Mary, the owl had a letter. Lily opened it and read Mary's news. She wanted her best friend to know before Lily saw it in the newspaper. Mary had married Malcolm Wilkes, and they were both staying at the MacDonalds for the next couple of days, before planning to spend some time in Paris before returning to Hogwarts with the rest of the students.

Lily gasped, "Mary and Malcolm just went and got married. How could they?"

"Didn't you tell me they planned on doing that?" Severus asked.

"Not now. They're still in school. And what about Malcolm's family?"

"He doesn't need them now that MacDonald has that money."

"But why would they do it now, Sev?"

Severus shrugged at Lily. He did not think like her so she would not understand anything he said. Perhaps MacDonald and Wilkes did not want to risk the other meeting a better witch or wizard? Neither of them were as repulsive or desperate as him, even if MacDonald was a werewolf, so the other went along with the idea.

"Did they say anything to you?" Lily asked.

"No. They don't need my permission to do anything."

"I didn't mean you needed to know, but maybe Malcolm said something?"

"No," Severus replied. He knew Wilkes considered Lily a waste of Severus' time so there was no need to communicate further about his plans. Lily said plenty of times that she was only friends with Severus. The Slytherins did advise him that it was inconvenient that Evans was head girl and sharing a room with him. Now that Severus had wealth, other women could come round to seriously considering him for more than help with homework. Severus did not bother telling them that he rather not bother with a girl that only talked to him for money while in her mind she thought about how ugly and disgusting Severus was. Perhaps she would be a good liar, convince him that she'd marry him, and then kill him off for the money so she could end her self-imposed torture of having to be civil to him, or worse by allowing him to touch her.

Since Sev was no help because he was not agreeing with her, Lily went into the kitchen to talk with her mum. Mrs. Evans was not agreeable either. She speculated that if Mary had the same problem that Lily did, since Mary was also attacked by a werewolf, she was doing the right thing by marrying her boyfriend. That's what nice, respectable young ladies did.

* * *

Holiday conversation between gathered pureblood families did touch upon the sudden elevation in Severus Snape's status. Who was he that Lord Voldemort would wipe out the Lestranges and give Snape their position? They knew that muggles could not kill wizards, so obviously the Dark Lord killed the Lestranges. Some claimed to be present when Bellatrix tried to plead for her life.

Lord Voldemort was not celebrating Christmas, but was planning something big to ring in the holiday and get him back on the front page of the newspaper, rather than the usual drivel that The Prophet was printing these days.

This would show them all his power. No one ever broke wizards out of Azkaban. Only Lord Voldemort could. The human guards and walls? It was as if they did not exist against his power. The magic protection was weak. The dementors were not a problem. They were willing to negotiate. Anyone not joining the Dark Lord was theirs.

Dolohov, Travers and Rowle were already Death Eaters. A number of the prisoners incarcerated for life or here for an extended stay were thankful for Lord Voldemort's generous offer. He did not tell the others what was in store for them for not accepting his offer, but did give his old mentor, Horace Slughorn, a choice. Join him or be kissed. Slughorn did have skills he could use.

Horace sputtered impotently. Wandless, there was little he could do. He accepted Riddle's offer with the hope that he could improvise his escape later. He was innocent, and certainly had no intention of being kissed by a dementor. From the inside of Riddle's organization, he may be able to gather information for Albus.

Sirius overheard what was going on, while he was lounging about as a dog and ignoring the dementors. Voldemort. He hated that guy. Almost as much as he hated Snape. With everything that was going on, this might be the perfect time for him to slip out and save Apolline.

* * *

When Lily returned to the den to talk to Severus, she found that he had retreated from Christmas by going back upstairs. She nudged open the guest room door and instead of Sev working on more of his arithmancy, he was laying down on his side with his arms over his head.

"Are you alright, Sev?" Lily asked. Sometimes, he got horrible headaches.

Severus moved his arm and glanced at Lily, before responding, "I suppose."

"Why are you lying down?"

"No reason," he lied. They'd probably have more Christmas things to do with him. It did last an entire day. He had been hoping to take a break between activities, rather than a constant onslaught from the minute Lily woke him up at dawn till he was allowed to go to sleep tonight. Severus wanted time to think about things.

* * *

The next day the news broke with photos of all the escaped Death Eaters. Everyone knew that Dolohov, Travers, Rowle and Sirius Black were among his most trusted followers. They suspected that a couple murderers were also, but some of these others, including Horace Slughorn … the conspiracy was deeper than anyone knew.


	54. Chapter 54 Scared Straight

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

AN: Even though Apolline is half-veela and could have any man she wants, she'd only want someone as wonderful as Sirius Black unless she was under the effect of some spell or potion. Sirius knows that. As soon as he can get her cured, she'd fall in love with him all over again. Lily's also come to her senses and is taking the next portkey to Portugal to become Potter's quidditch groupie.

**Snape's Worst Memory**

**Chapter 54 Scared Straight**

Dung's ploy to be a pile of rags in his cell had not worked. Maybe infiltrating Voldemort's minions had been Albus' plan all along. Would have helped to get some warning, rather than letting him think he had been forgotten to rot in Azkaban. Had to be careful though, He Who … or the Dark Lord sort of knew things. About him. Things Dung had not told anyone. Travers said he his Lord was all-powerful, but Travers was none too sharp. Dung tried to reciprocate by not looking bright himself. Couldn't have them catching on that he'd be legging it as soon as he got the chance.

So far, Horace had learned nothing. Riddle … or the Dark Lord, had not even given him his wand back. He had seen it being twirled around the Dark Lord's fingers as he outlined what he wanted Horace to do for him after a good meal, a bath, and a good night's sleep. Now that that was out of the way, along with breakfast, Horace was anxious to get some information and his wand then get out of here.

Fortunately, Lord Voldemort made the plans around here. He was pleased with the newspaper offering him pages of coverage, after months of keeping him off the front page. If he had his way, he'd be on the front page every day. Horace Slughorn could take care of that.

This Sirius Black was an annoyance. He escaped during the confusion, and could now be creating havoc. Voldemort did not mind that so much, it was only that Black claimed his every action was due to the Dark Lord. The gormless masses did not even realize Black could not cast the Dark Mark. Voldemort had plans, and it was unlikely that one insignificant person could interfere with them, but Black was not too particular about who he injured or killed. He already got the Lestranges and Orion Black, his own father, killed.

Some of his new recruits seemed quite eager to join the winning side. Not all of them were the right sort. Had to weed out the mudbloods and blood traitors, but there were definitely some purebloods among them. But first, dear Professor Slughorn.

"Rowle," Voldemort called.

The Death Eater came running at the sound of his master's voice, prostrated himself, and murmured, "My lord," to the floor.

"Your left arm, Rowle."

Immediately Rowle obeyed, and Voldemort called his Death Eaters to his side. Horace Slughorn was worth a little ceremony, and he would not go far on his own with a Dark Mark on his arm. Slughorn would be his from now on. Except he'd have to tone that constant chatter about how important he was. Voldemort would want names, starting with those that Slughorn could influence in the media and the Ministry.

* * *

Severus decided to keep his word and give Lily till July. By then, she could firm up her plans for how she was going to spend her money by traveling about, meeting and shagging others.

He should worry about himself, rather than her. Lily certainly was not planning anything for him, other than waiting for a few years, to then tell him to piss off. It sounded as if her whole plan to become a healer and apply muggle medical advances to wizards was gone. It had been a daft idea. Wizards did not like new things, unless it was the latest model of racing broom.

He returned to the main Lestrange house, and found many house elves volunteering to become the Wilkes' house elves, even after he told them that Mrs. Wilkes was a werewolf. He took down a list of names, ages and genders then set them to work packing more things that he pointed out. Severus also asked them to do something about the smell.

Severus moved the boxes of books to the vault, and popped in to see if his solicitor was free for advice on the house elves.

Lily was annoyed that Severus left so early. He didn't even wait for her to get up before he said good-bye to her mum. He also did not see the newspaper. Death Eaters were breaking out of Azkaban, including Sirius Black and fantastically enough, Horace Slughorn. Wizards that did not like Severus.

He did not return until after lunch.

"Where were you?" Lily asked.

"London mostly."

"Why'd you go there?"

"I was looking into some things and had letters to mail. Why?"

"Because Death Eaters broke out of Azkaban last night. You could have been in danger."

"Why would He Who Must Not Be Named make me their top priority? He has others without having to break those ones out to hunt me down special."

"How can you be so flippant?"

"Since when did you start believing that people disliked me that much, Lily?"

"It'd be pretty stupid not to think that people wanted you dead. They're mad and deranged, and we knew a handful at school who thought you should be stamped out like a bug simply because you exist."

"You too. You are muggleborn."

"Yeah, except they got all cute with me."

"I told you that. Act like they fancy you to trick you, use you, then discard you."

"Hmm."

* * *

Someone could have knocked Albus over with a feather when Barty told him that Voldemort had broken a bunch of prisoners out of Azkaban, including Horace Slughorn and Mundungus Fletcher. Many were kissed by the dementors who became confused when the human staff was killed and the cell doors opened. That's probably why Horace and Dung ran out of there, and not in the company of Voldemort. Some of these fellows were in Azkaban before Tom even graduated from Hogwarts.

However, Barty Jr. was able to use this turn of events to his advantage. Father paid him no mind, but mother took him seriously and made arrangements with father's office for his whole defense study group to get some serious instruction on the _patronus_ charm.

He got to writing invitations to everyone and mother even took him to the post office to get them out promptly since they only had one owl. Mrs. Crouch was seriously concerned about confused dementors. She overheard they didn't have a true count of how many were at Azkaban to tell if any wandered off. Learning the _patronus_ charm was the only defense against them.

* * *

Severus had been asleep when Lily crept into the guest room and woke him.

"Sev?"

"What?"

"I couldn't sleep."

"Did you want me to charm you to sleep?"

"No."

"Then what?"

"I'm scared, Sev."

"Of what?"

"How could Death Eaters leave Azkaban?"

"I don't know."

Lily lifted the covers and slid under them next to him. "Aren't you scared, Sev?"

"There's nothing I can do about it."

"What if Black tells them how he got into Hogwarts?"

Severus sighed. They could make portkeys, and eventually Black may come to that conclusion. However, would Black risk returning to Hogwarts to settle the score with him? Probably with Death Eaters supporting him, however wouldn't the Dark Lord prefer a target like Dumbledore, rather than Severus? If any of them were caught, would they even bother sending them back to Azkaban?

"Sev," Lily prompted with an elbow to his side.

"What do you want me to do?"

"You're always coming up with plans, Sev."

If Severus was able to come up with any good plans, his parents would be alive, and Lily would want to stay with him.

Annoyed that Severus was not saying anything constructive, Lily turned towards him and let out a long, warm sigh against his neck. He moved his arm and held her hand. Why should he put any effort into this? Lily would only pat him on the head, and then share his ideas with her sexual conquests so they could protect her. She wanted a handsome hero. Not someone who lucked out saving her from a werewolf.

Lily was thinking things were getting worse if Severus was the one pretending to be brave.

* * *

There were posters everywhere in wizarding Britain. Sirius felt that was a horrible photo of him. He had been in the middle of telling them what a bunch of pinheaded pissants they all were when they took it.

He recognized Horace Slughorn. Since when did he join up with Moldyfart? He may have been a Death Eater all along, working his way through the students to see who was amenable to a little pureblooded nonsense. That's why old Sluggy passed over Sirius, but loved little Regulus. Baby Reggie would make a good Death Eater with his idiot savant friend, Crouch.

It took a while to get anywhere as a big dog while getting some decent food. People, even muggles who did not call him the grim, did not like the looks of him. Animal-hating jerks had him resorting to eating out of bins.

He had to get to Paris. The French at least had better quality rubbish for him to eat while waiting to see Apolline, or to demand where she was from her parents.

* * *

For a normally independent Gryffindor, Lily was acting unusual. She did not want Severus to leave her house. She annoyed him with hours of talk about his safety, her safety, and her mother's safety. Sirius Black and his Death Eater associates could be in the neighborhood. If Potter knew where she lived, Black probably already knew.

When he retreated upstairs to read or work on homework, Lily kept coming up to check on him. Severus did not need someone asking every twenty minutes if he was hungry or thirsty. He was raised to be self-sufficient, and he was suspicious that if he replied to Lily that he would like her to fetch him whatever she offered, she wouldn't like it.

Severus had put some spells on this house, but if the Dark Lord wanted in, that would not stop him. The spells were too basic because this was not his house nor was he was not related to the inhabitants.

However, her fear seemed overcome in time to attend a Wigtown Wanderer game. She made no sense.

* * *

If this did not bring Moony to his senses, nothing would. James knew that Moony was deranged carrying on about going back to school and taking his NEWTs … of all the Merlin-transfigured things! Settling for going back to sixth year, when he stopped? What an insult!

Arriving at the Lupins, James was yelling for Remus before the door was even opened, "Moony! Moony!"

"Prongs? What's the problem?"

"Black broke out of Azkaban. Let's catch him."

"Us? How? He's with Death Eaters."

"We can't let him stab us in the back and get away with it. Azkaban was keeping Black safe from us."

"What about Portugal?"

"I can go to practice and games and portkey back. You can investigate leads while I'm away. You're the smart, sensible one, Moony."

"As the sensible one, I recommend we don't go looking for He Who Must Not Be Named."

"Ah come on. Dumbledore's not doing a good job of it, and neither is the Ministry. We can be heroes."

"We can be dead."

"We know what Black is. We won't make the same mistake as Wormtail."

"It's too dangerous."

"Just Black than. It's personal, Moony."

Remus shook his head, "I'm going back to school, James. I can keep my eye on the newspaper, and keep my ears open, but that's it."

"Oh brilliant! You think he'll nip back to Hogwarts to finish whatever he was up to when he got caught?"

"I hope not."

* * *

With the Wilkes being on their honeymoon till they saw them at the Ministry after the first week of January, Severus did not receive a reply till then.

Mrs. Wilkes, or MacDonald, threw herself on him in the Ministry lobby when the two of them came out of the floo. "Oh, Severus, you're so wonderful. My parents would love to train them up for Malcolm and I."

"They are rude."

"I heard that one, but with us needing extra help when I change, they'd be perfect. You're so good to think of me."

"Yes, Snape, very generous of you. Thank you," Wilkes said.

"Should I send them round tomorrow?"

"Sure."

"What?" Lily asked.

"Severus gave us four house elves for our wedding gift," Mary told her friend gleefully.

"He did?"

"Yeah, isn't that great?"

"I guess," Lily responded. Why didn't Severus ask Lily before he went and did something like that? From what Helen and Mary said, each house elf was valuable. Even if Sev did not like them, he couldn't just go giving them away.

Lily watched Severus as he lined up with the others to get his wand looked at. They already knew from their research that house elves could watch werewolves and use their magic to restrain them from hurting others. Why didn't he just give them one or two? He was going to regret it later when he needed house elves of his own to do things.

Other students from their defense study group arrived in the lobby, and joined them on line. They congratulated the Wilkes on their wedding. In the lift, they mentioned the Death Eater escape, and Mary said she was so worked up over that she thought she saw Sirius Black in Paris. Malcolm added he had not, but saw a French dog so ugly it could be mistaken for a grim.

All of them were supposed to meet Barty Crouch Jr. and his mother on the second level, in front of the Magical Law Enforcement office.

As a new auror, Proudfoot got the job of teaching Hogwarts students the _patronus _charm. Crouch's son was supposed to be among this lot, and he recognized Mrs. Crouch who was tagging along to keep an eye on things. A couple of other parents decided to stay too.

He got them into a room, and one girl had already gotten enough down with the spell to get some silver out of her wand. The others seemed hopeless at first.

Lily did not like this Proudfoot guy since he didn't seem helpful. It was like he was reciting the text they had at school. Focus on a happy memory and cast. If it were that easy, the room would be full of silver animals running about.

Over an hour later, there were only three animals: Summerby's small sheep, and Mary's and Malcolm's wolves. Black was getting silver out of his wand now.

Proudfoot announced, "We have permission from the Ministry to use a portkey to go to Azkaban and expose you to a real dementor that is under our control. This will be a test for those that can cast it, to see if they can cast it while under a dementor's influence. For you others, it might inspire you to keep practicing."

Severus did not want to go to Azkaban to meet a dementor. Other adult wizards and witches joined them. It got worse. They were not portkeyed to Azkaban, but outside somewhere cold and windy. They had to take a bloody boat to the actual prison. Why was it necessary to meet a dementor, when the whole trip made one miserable? Crouch may be exploiting his father's connections to get them access to this place, but Severus could not imagine truly thanking him. He supposed it was important to prove the seriousness of needing this spell.

Once they could see Azkaban from the boat, the lot of them grew uneasy. It was a dismal, ugly structure towering above the waves. Unlike the Ministry or Hogwarts, there was no statue or decortation dedicated to a founder or expressing its purpose. They could also see dementors flocking around it like gulls against the black stone. If they were outside, was the stone thick enough to protect the prisoners inside? Did they even have cells on the exterior wall, where the prisoners could hear the constant pounding of the surf?

The dementors could be felt as they disembarked from the boat. Even with Lily holding his hand, Severus was miserable, or more miserable than he was from having to take this horrible field trip. Why was he even here? He couldn't cast this charm. Everyone said he was a talentless piece of rubbish, pretty much from the minute he was born. Lily even drew a huge colorful circle using his birth date to prove he was worthless using the quasi-science of divination. Nothing he did mattered.

Lily felt horrible. It must be terrible locked up in Azkaban with these things around. She held onto Sev's hand. Her whole life was feeling like a big mistake. There was so much she could be doing. Sev was right that Lily was wasting her opportunities.

Casting or trying to cast a patronus with a dementor around was very difficult. There were no happy memories left in Lily's head. She had a whole bunch of them before. She knew that, or maybe not. Maybe she had never been happy.

Summerby eventually got her lamb to show up and that drove the dementor from the room, deeper into the dark prison.

With no dementors in the same room, both of the Wilkes' wolves appeared, Crouch had a mischievous fox, and Black's patronus was a big mastiff dog.

After some large bars of chocolate were passed around, Black and Crouch started joking around about the mastiff's traits. It could lay down on top of a dementor and crush it. It could shake its head and spray patronus spit in a wide defensive semicircle.

On the boat ride back to the shore, Lily was highly disappointed with herself. Severus may never be able to cast this charm. He was brilliant at doing spells, but something that required someone to be happy and keep that in his mind with a dementor around, was highly unlikely. After all the times he helped Lily, it was only right that she should learn it to protect them.

If Severus let himself fall over the side of the boat, would anyone care? That auror probably had a head count of the number of students he needed to bring back. It would be embarrassing to be fished out of the North Sea by another wizard. They'd probably tell bath jokes about him.

When they returned to the Ministry, Severus declined the Wilkes' invitation to dinner, "Mrs. Evans is expecting us."

Lily did not bother arguing because it was the truth, and Severus did not look well. Otherwise, she would have taken them up on their offer to hear about their wedding and trip to Paris. Reading about it all in a letter would not be good enough, but she'd see them soon when they all went back to Hogwarts.

* * *

Horace had agreed with many of the Dark Lord's followers that he did not deserve the Dark Mark. From what he gathered, only the closest Death Eaters got to have one branded into their arm. However, Riddle singled him out for this honor, and without his wand there was little Horace could do to resist. As he claimed many times, it was actually a curse to be as popular as him, and now he had the proof of it branded into his left arm till Albus could get this bloody ugly tattoo off. A skull with a snake? Was that supposed to be clever and scary?

Luckily it was his left arm, so he was not overly pained to start work on his correspondence on behalf of the Dark Lord. Horace knew what was asked of him, but tried to be so subtle that his message was almost nonexistent. Bloody well bad enough that Cuffe chose a merry looking photo of him to illustrate he broke out of Azkaban. The paper was vague as to whether he left for his own safety, or in the company of others. At least Cuffe was dependable on that point.

* * *

Severus was still not recovered when they finished flooing and apparating so excused himself from dinner to lie down complaining of a headache.

Lily explained how alarming the prison was, and the total despair caused by the dementor guard to her mother. There was still damage that they could see to the stone building from the breakout.

Even if Lily was there in a deep depression, she did not think she'd join up with He Who Must Not Be Named if he flung open her cell door. Both Prof. Slughorn and that thief friend of Dumbledore's went running off with him. Prof. Slughorn had probably already served at least thirty days of his ninety day sentence, if Lily remembered correctly. He might have even been as far along as half done. They weren't as bad off as Sirius Black with a life sentence. That's what they'd end up with if they were caught again.

Bored with watching television after dinner, Lily went upstairs to check on Severus. She had not been expecting him to be goofing off with any arithmancy, however she intended to be quiet in case his head was worse. Since she did not hear him snoring, Lily doubted he was asleep when she opened the door to the guest room.

It was dark, but the light from the hall showed Severus lying on his side, above the covers, and he was still dressed with even his shoes still on. Lily sighed loudly and went in with the intention of taking off his shoes and socks. How could someone sleep with their shoes on? Sev was just plain weird sometimes.

"What are you doing?" Severus lowly asked when he felt Lily messing with his feet.

"You left your shoes on, Sev."

"Can you leave them alone?"

"No," Lily replied while struggling with one of the tight double knots that he used.

"Lily, I want to be left alone."

"I know you weren't asleep."

Severus did not bother mentioning that he doubted that would matter. He sat up, reached down, and pulled off both his shoes without bothering to untie them.

"You're not supposed to take them off like that," Lily complained.

"Just stop, Lily."

"What?"

"Whatever you're doing."

"Sev, your socks are still on," Lily reminded him as she grabbed one of his feet.

"I was in here alone. Why would my shoes and socks bother you?"

"Because it's wrong."

"Everything about me is wrong."

"Sev ...," Lily started, then asked about the bared foot in her hand, "Why's your foot so cold?"

Severus swallowed hard, and willed himself not to start crying. Why did Lily keep asking stupid 'why' questions? He did not intentionally have cold feet, dragonpox pockmarks, or a big nose.

Lily pulled off his other sock, and rubbed that foot between her hands, then switched to the other one. "You should get under the covers, or they won't stay warmed up."

When Severus did nothing, Lily made a noise of disgust and got up to talk to his face. She leaned down and asked, "Are you listening to me?"

Thinking he did not look well, Lily put her hand on his forehead. It felt cool, maybe too cool, rather than warm. He was also blinking more than usual, and his dark eyes were shiny. "Sev?"

"What?"

"I know you said you don't feel well. Is something else wrong?"

"No."

"Is it from earlier with the dementor?"

"Maybe," he muttered in reply. "Can't I just be left alone for a while?"

"Sev, did you pass on the chocolate?"

"I don't want chocolate, Lily."

"That's why you're not feeling well. Mum can make you some hot chocolate or chocolate milk, if you don't want to eat any."

"Why are you so opposed to me laying here quietly?"

"I'm not. You look upset."

"I'm not thinking about anything new. The dementor did not effect me that badly."

Lily made a face. Her friend most likely thought the worst about everything so that might be why a dementor had no new suggestions for him. "Get under the covers then tell me some of the stuff, and I'll tell you how the dementor made it seem worse," she suggested.

"What do you mean?"

"It twists things."

"Not really. Everything was already there."

Lily rolled her eyes as she shoved him over and pulled the covers back. "Get under there."

Severus cooperated and allowed Lily to arrange the blanket to her satisfaction. She sat down on the bed next to him and prompted, "So?"

"What?"

"What did the dementor make you think about?"

"My parents. If I hadn't gone to Hogwarts, they might be alive. I realize it was not something I intentionally did, but if I hadn't gotten Black's and Potter's attention ..."

"That wasn't you, Sev. That first day, I was sitting in the train compartment next to the window, waiting for you to change when they came in and sat down. They ignored me completely until you returned. They were probably sizing each other up to start a fight when they decided to form Team Toerag, and attack you two to one."

"Still, it's things like that. Nothing I purposely did." Severus couldn't feel guilty about trapping Black at Hogwarts because Black was a murdering Death Eater, and not the generalization that most Gryffindors applied to all Slytherins either. A couple thoughts of Slughorn entered his mind earlier today, but Slughorn joined with He Who Must Not Be Named when given a chance. Even if he was new to the Death Eaters, it did not speak too highly of someone who would rather be a Death Eater than go without his creature comforts for another forty-three days.

"At least you understand that. I've heard that prisoners can go crazy. Now that I got a taste of it, I can believe it."

"Hmm."

"That's it?"

"What else do you want to hear, Lily?"

"Whatever you want to talk about, Sev."

"I don't want to talk about anything." Of course there were a lot of thoughts in his head, but most of them were regarding Lily, or things that effected her like the Lestranges or the other things he inherited with people's changing public attitude towards him, although he was the same slimy, repulsive person he had been since first year.

"What about those house elves? Isn't four a lot?"

"It may be," Severus admitted, "but I'd rather give them extra than risk MacDonald's safety." Unlike most of Hogwarts, both MacDonald and Wilkes actually talked to him civilly prior to all this head boy and inheritance nonsense.

Lily bit her bottom lip. When Severus put it that way, four house elves was a small price. She'd gladly do more housework for that. With Sev and magic, there would hardly be anything extra to even complain about. If Potter was so wealthy, and such the concerned and loving good friend he said he was to Lupin, why didn't he have some of his house elves keep an eye on the werewolf? Lily knew why Black wouldn't. He liked people getting hurt, killed, and he didn't seem to care if it was Lupin that ended up dead or hurt.

She put her hand on Sev's chest and tried to rub it through the blanket. Despite Severus claiming he had no friends, he was nicer to his 'acquaintances' than most of these other wizards and witches, even the ones with supposedly sterling reputations. Lily could count on the fingers of one hand the Gryffindors she trusted: Mary, Prof. McGonagall and Frank Longbottom. She was not sure about the Slytherins, other than Severus. Prof. Slughorn had seemed awfully nice to her till Lily got dragonpox. Was Sev right about him being interested in a person's looks rather than talent?

Severus stayed silent for a long while, even though his eyes were closed. Lily thought he was still awake since she couldn't remember him ever sleeping without snoring. It usually started within a couple of minutes of him dozing off. She found it too quiet here at home to sleep without Sev in the room.

He did not mind Lily rubbing his chest if she did not ask more questions about how he felt or what he was thinking about. The question about the house elves was unexpected. Why wouldn't he want to get rid of some of them? Severus could look into who could owe him the biggest favor, but what was the likelihood of someone ever paying it back? If the house elves were theirs, there was no leverage. With MacDonald owing him a life debt, it was in his best interests to keep her alive and out of Azkaban to pay it back. At least she'd be magically compelled to do something for him if the opportunity arose, rather than standing around cheering and laughing.

* * *

Albus was growing worried. Days were passing, and he had still not heard from Dung or Horace. If they were in the midst of Tom's camp, having Fawkes show up carrying a message would undoubtedly be their death warrants. Both were resourceful. They at least had that in their favor.

The Order had suffered a number of setbacks, including the loss of the vital information that Dung was able to ferret out of his contacts before he got sent to Azkaban. Albus could not help but feel responsible for that.

Horace had resisted joining the order. Claimed he didn't want a target on his backside.

He needed more Order members. Diverse, brave, undoubtedly on their side, rather than Tom's, and not completely loyal to the Ministry. Frank and Alice would not be finished with their auror training for at least another year, but they were keen to fight Voldemort. Last year's graduates had no one suitable, and this year had slim pickings too. Albus hardly needed to glance into Severus' eyes anymore to feel how much he was loathed. There were only two Gryffindors left, and both Lily Evans and Mary MacDonald had witnessed every misfortune that befell their friend. Sirius Black had truly done his master's work with sowing distrust of the school itself and Gryffindor house. Years of students, both above and below him had been tainted.

* * *

Lily appreciated being able to apparate to King's Cross even more today. Mum would have come down with them on the train, and then had to go home alone. She could visit Petunia, but Tunie had come up with Vernon on New Year's. Her sister already knew that Severus had been staying for the holiday, but couldn't help saying something when she saw him in person. Severus was used to her, however mum plainly stating his house did not have proper heating didn't come out quite right. Sev ignored that too while waiting for his chance to sneak back upstairs.

Was her family wrong for Severus? He tolerated mum hugging him goodbye earlier so it wasn't entirely lost. Lily did not know how he got by without craving company, other than her.

Since their compartment was reserved for the head boy and head girl, there was no hurry to get on the train, but other than Mary and Malcolm, Lily was not interested in waiting for anyone else. Crouch was a bit weird, and Black looked too much like his older brother for her to get comfortable around him.

Mary was able to find Lily easily between her red hair and Severus lurking behind her.

They saw the Wilkes approaching them, hand in hand, and Mary shouted to be heard with all the animals and children, "Let's get on the train already. It's cold out here."

As the four of them were about to leave the platform, Mary grabbed Lily's elbow and hissed, "Is that Lupin?"

"Where?" Lily asked as everyone else looked in the direction Mary was.

It was Remus Lupin with two older people, probably his parents. He had a school trunk and was getting on the train.

Malcolm urged, "Don't stare. We can talk about it on the train."

"But ..." Mary started to argue, but between Malcolm physically pulling her on the train and Severus stepping between her and Lupin to block her view, she acceded.

Lily complained, "Why is he here?" but followed everyone else onto the train, when she realized the others were leaving her on the platform alone.

After looking around carefully, Malcolm closed the door and warded it while Severus cast _langlock_ nonverbally.

Severus stated, "If Lupin was not expelled with Black and Potter, than I suppose he was readmitted."

"If I had known that," Mary replied, "I wouldn't have forgiven him until after I graduated."

"What can we do about it?" Lily asked.

"Do?" Severus asked. It was one thing to make a fool of Potter at a quidditch game, but Lupin was not as easily taunted. The only weakness he perceived was Lupin's lycanthropy, and that was too risky to mess around with.

"Can't we all treat him like he treated Severus for years? Attack him in the halls, the stairs, the boys' room, on the lawn and in the Great Hall?" Mary asked.

Malcolm reminded her, "We're supposed to be more mature than that, Mary. That's why we're staying in the big people's rooms, instead of the dormitories now."

"Find out why he's here," Severus suggested.

"Why he's here?" Lily repeated. "To be a toerag. What does he need an education for? Everyone knows he's a werewolf that killed a person and turned another for either fun or to help out his Death Eater buddy."

"Not necessarily," Malcolm cautioned. "Lupin was usually their lookout and alibi. He may have something else in mind."

"I don't care," Mary stated, folding her arms over her chest.

"Oh, don't get me wrong, sweetheart. I'll protect you from him, and I'm certainly _not_ going to be friendly."

"Neither am I," Lily agreed. "Head girls don't have to like anyone."

"Lupin already knows we don't like him," Severus reminded them. "Perhaps he's smart enough to realize we hate him, but with that lot, one can't be sure. However, we should pretend like we're ignoring him until we know what he's up to, rather than just being a toerag, as Lily suggested. He could do that anywhere. He doesn't need to return to Hogwarts for that."

"Sure he can," Lily disagreed. "What better way to show that he got away with everything he's done so far?"

"Oh no," moaned Mary.

"What?"

"Do you think they'll have him in the same room in the dungeons with me? Ugh."

"We'll see," Malcolm answered menancingly.

* * *

Remus was shunned by even the Gryffindors and ended up in a compartment with some first years, still excited over their Christmas holiday. He had hours of listening to their merriment and those of their friends that stopped by to chat.

During that time, he reassured himself that he was doing the right thing. Sure, it may sound like fun to join James in Portugal, but what would he have to show for it, other than Broomfleet paraphernalia and improving his Portuguese?

Prongs' plan to somehow catch up with Black and do something to him was fine for someone playing quidditch all over Europe to talk about. Sometimes Remus had to admit that James was sometimes all talk and no action.


	55. Chapter 55 Again?

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

**Chapter 55 Again?**

Why was there always a drawback? Lily wondered as she uncomfortably woke, feeling stifled because she was too warm. Severus had moved up against her back after they fell asleep. Initially she was annoyed because he had his arm solidly around her, however then she realized his hand was on one of her breasts. He was snoring onto the back of her neck. Lily shifted slightly, trying to get more comfortable, and then felt how hard he was against her bottom.

Again? Lily reached for her wand to cast a time charm. Hmm, maybe Sev had rested up enough. She was pretty sure that he had already done it three times. Definitely in the bathtub because she was looking at his face as she straddled him, then when they came out with Lily standing, bent over, holding onto the bedpost, then once more slow in bed.

Was it because they hadn't in a couple weeks, or that Sev was finally building up some stamina to catch up to her and do it more often? Why was she even bothering to think right now?

Lily wiggled her bum against Sev while pulling up the hem of her nightgown. She rolled her eyes as he grunted something in his sleep before a phlegmy sounding snore indicated that he was not truly waking.

She needed to squirm more to work on the front hem of his nightshirt. Why couldn't this be a night that both there nightclothes rode up to above their waists while they slept? That would make it so much simpler since Sev's body weight kept his right where it was.

As her movement grew more insistent, Severus stirred. Again? He thought to himself as he felt Lily pulling on his nightshirt to get at his cock that she was also rubbing with her arse. He shifted to let her finish getting the fabric out of the way. It was probably already soiled from Lily wiping herself on it. Their sheets got pretty disgusting too, before they charmed them clean again.

He lay still, letting Lily put her upper leg atop his and try to get his cock lined up from behind to spoon together while shagging. After she tried to angle it in an uncomfortable direction one time too many, Severus shifted his hips to give Lily what she wanted.

Rocking against Severus, she thought he had been awake, but then after about ten or fifteen minutes, he started snoring again. What was wrong with him? Sev fell asleep while they're having sex? She elbowed him.

Severus sighed after his rude awakening. What did Lily expect from him? After three times in the past six hours, it was going to take a long time, and it wouldn't happen with her in charge because she was mostly concerned with what felt good for her. Why did she even care if he came again? She couldn't screw herself cross-eyed if he was no longer hard.

It took a long time, but eventually Lily got tired, slowed, then stopped moving as she dozed off.

When she woke in the early morning, Lily's body felt stiff because she still had her leg awkwardly bent back over Sev's. Reaching down with her hand to confirm what she thought she felt, he was still in her … while sleeping. Weird, but kind of lovely in a way. Sometimes it felt she just could not get enough of Sev's body, and it felt reassuring that she could have him there for hours at a time. Exciting too … everything got all achy thinking about shagging for hours at a time. Her nipples became so sensitive she decided to pull off her nightgown because they hurt so much. She wanted them bare.

After the mostly peaceful couple of weeks at the Evans, Severus should have expected Lily to wake him numerous times. It was barely dawn and she was twitching her internal muscles around his cock besides writhing against him with her naked body.

He felt the chill from her pushing the covers down besides the visual evidence she was displaying as she turned a bit to show him her chest.

"Thank goodness you're awake, Sev. I need some of that rough stuff you like."

Feeling mischievous since Lily thought Severus moving and actually letting his flesh audibly smack against her was as far as it could go, he grabbed his wand and suggested, "Kneel on the bed and hold your hands close over your head."

"Like this? What …? Hey!"

Severus had secured Lily's hands to the crosspiece of the canopy and began adjusting it while holding her in position, making the restraints a shorter length to stretch her body and barely let her knees rest on the bed.

"Not too uncomfortable?" he asked.

"What are you going to do?"

"You did ask, Lily. From the front or behind?"

"Start with the front."

Severus got into position, then suggested, "Rather than kneeling, wrap your legs around my waist."

"Like this?"

"Hmm."

Afterwards, Lily wanted more rather than getting cleaned up, dressed and getting down to breakfast followed by class. She was too aware of her body. Not just down there, but Sev had taken advantage of her hands being out of the way to torture her breasts too. His mouth had been so hot and hungry and felt soothing and torturous too. Then there were his hands … Lily's thoughts about Severus were interrupted by the sight of Lupin at the Gryffindor table eating breakfast. She was satisfied that the younger boys were not acting like they were welcoming back one of their long lost heroes. Heroes should want to save people, not hurt and laugh at them.

* * *

Horace Slughorn felt as if his fingers were worn down to the nub. His mail was being redirected to the Hogsmeade post office and opened before he got to read it for himself.

He finally got out to go to a dinner party, but it was at one of his brother Death Eater's homes, where Horace was expected to be his witty, charming self while also talking about some of the excellent ideas the Dark Lord had about reforming society.

Albus better get his arse moving and get him out of here, get this ugly tattoo off his arm, and maybe take him on a relaxing vacation to some tropical island where the girls draped necklaces of flowers around their necks.

His pleasant daydreams about topless native ladies was interrupted by Dolohov.

"You almost done with your new list, Professor?"

"Soon," Horace sighed.

"It is going to be better than that last one?"

Horace was surprised. It sounded like Dolohov was concerned for him. "I'm trying my best," he said in a tone indicating how overwrought he was with all this work and the round of _cruciatus_ he suffered for his first list of likely students ready to join the Dark Lord.

How was Horace supposed to know that the Dark Lord already knew who Severus Snape was? That name was on the top of his first list because if someone deserved to either be in Azkaban or bowing before Tom Riddle, it was that wretch Snape. After Snape, Horace had listed all Snape's friends – Wilkes, Rosier, Regulus Black, and Barty Crouch Jr. They all had top marks so it was not as if Horace was suggesting poor choices.

* * *

Things were actually quiet at Hogwarts for Lily. Now that Mary and Malcolm were together in wherever the married students quarters were, and Mary said she wasn't allowed to tell her, their rooms were emptier. They still had the defense study group on Fridays, and all the subjects had been covered at least once prior to the holiday break. There was still practice for the _patronus_ charm, but those that got it, could easily do it without dementors around, and those that couldn't, including herself and Severus, believed they would never cast it. There were still a couple Gryffindors that showed up on Saturdays for Severus to abuse their arithmancy skills, but Lily noted he would show them how to arrive at an answer.

She was slightly annoyed that Severus had started using part of his bath for some potions experiments. At first, it was only one cauldron, then two. Now he had five or six cooking up something. Lily had offered to help, but was only asked to prepare ingredients. Severus did explain a little of it to her, but it was involved with that stupid arithmancy of his.

Severus was enjoying the newfound quiet of their rooms. Phi liked it too, especially when they moved into Lily's bedroom for sleeping so she could use that window since Severus was more inclined to get up to open it for her when it was in the same room.

Lily still had a number of visitors to their rooms and spent a portion of her time in the Gryffindor common room. She also had a new attitude that she should make the best out of the six months she had remaining at Hogwarts. There were NEWTs of course, but also she realized the amount of time she frittered away could be put to better use.

For Lily's birthday, Severus purposely invited about two dozen students to their rooms for a party with a decorated cake from the kitchens.

She was disappointed because Severus had gotten her a jade necklace inset on a ornate platinum disk on a matching platinum chain to match her dress robes. No ring. Perhaps he was waiting till Valentine's Day?

Meanwhile, Remus had asked about Sirius' return to Hogwarts. Prongs wanted any leads and expected Remus to find them. A lot of things about the story struck Remus as strange … bizarre strange. However, Sirius waving a dead badger following a quidditch game was not what he found suspicious. The Peruvian darkness powder was something James had been playing around with, not Sirius. Sirius could have gotten some of this own though. Being rare, that was a clue.

Severus Snape had been in their common room when Sirius showed up. This initially sounded like a lead, but then Remus found out Snape was still tutoring Gryffindors in arithmancy every Saturday. Snape was wily enough to keep up the tutoring pretense, but the one Gryffindor arithmancy student that was willing to talk to Remus said that Evans and MacDonald got him to tutor them since there were no Gryffinor seventh years that had the subject. Evans could make Snape do that, without there being some nefarious plot going on. Remus decided to leave that out of his letter to James because he still had some weird infatuation going on with Evans. Every letter since he returned included at the end asked 'P.S. How's Evans? She asking about me?'.

The sixth year boys were involved with tackling Sirius and were willing to give their blow-by-blow account of how it happened. Their description of Sirius sounded exactly like some crazy Padfoot plan to have a party, except he did not bring any food or drink. Was he expecting to go to the Hogwarts kitchen? He was also shirtless, which was not unusual for Sirius, but he had not painted a lion or something red on his chest. Just Padfoot showing off his muscles and chest hair.

Getting back to Snape, the Gryffindors said he lived up to the age-old tradition of Slytherin house and dove behind a couch to hide. That sounded a bit off to Remus. Sure, Snape was smart enough to get behind something, but he cast nothing? Perhaps they missed a tripping jinx or something else, but Snape would not settle for something that mild … oh, in the Gryffindor common room, maybe casting major hexes was a bad idea, in case everyone teamed up with Sirius and teamed up against him.

Remus summed up for James in a lengthy letter everything he had found out. It sounded like typical Sirius doing something reckless, showing up to find the Gryffindors had lost the game and were not in the midst of a party, tried to call James through the floo to get a party started, and then he got separated from his portkey. It was totally preposterous, therefore it was something Padfoot would do. What about Peter and Sirius' father being murdered? Even if Sirius had nothing to do with either of them, showing up like that did nothing to disprove his involvement.

Although James came up with some crazy ideas, Remus had to agree that Peter must have known something about Sirius. That was the only explanation that he could agree with. Prongs also had the alternate suggestion that it was Snape, but Snape had not made a move against Remus since he returned to school, as far as he knew. At least other Slytherins, especially Regulus Black, and a number of younger students made rude gestures and shot jinxes at him to pay him back for all the wedgies, toilet dunkings, and shoves down the stairs.

* * *

Dung finally got away at the beginning of February. He had taken Travers' wand, gotten outside the apparition wards, and got the hell out of there. He was tired of hearing about purebloods, kneeling on the floor, crappy food, water to drink, and acting like he was as clueless as the rest of the prisoners that were deemed not good enough for the Dark Mark. Thank goodness.

He finally got a message to Albus and when they met, the old man had the nerve to remind him, "Don't forget, Dung, you are an escaped criminal."

"Criminal? It's all thanks to you I was even there. Then you left me to rot in Azkaban until the Dark Lord busted me out. And a month of shacking up with him and his sort was no picnic either. You didn't happen to bring anything to drink, did you?"

"I could conjure up some wine."

"Wine? I need the good stuff, Albus. It's been a long dry spell, and I expect you to sort things out. Breaking into the Lestrange house. What did I let you talk me into?"

"It's no longer the Lestranges'."

"I don't give a rat's arse who's house it is or was. I got pissed on by house elves. I got hauled in by the Ministry. I got locked up by them, a speedy trial, and just when I thought you left me to spend two years in Azkaban, the Dark Lord shows up and starts putting magical marks on whoever he deems worthy to be a Death Eater."

"What kind of marks?"

"Skull and snake tattoo. Slughorn's got one."

"Horace?"

"Yeah, he was one of the first to take the Mark."

"Isn't he a prisoner?"

"Slughorn's certainly eating a lot better than me, and he gets his wine, mead, and whatever else he lists as a 'necessity'. Even attended a dinner party. Blooming escaped criminal? Why do I got treated like shit all the time? My whole business is run by me. Can't do it from prison. Can't do it while I'm banging my forehead against the floor and kissing robe hems. You owe me, Dumbledore."

"Pardon me, but I think you're forgetting ..."

"Forgetting! How long you gonna hold that over my head? Months in Azkaban and a month with Death Eaters should be payment in full. Now get something settled for me because I have not forgotten you are on the Wizengamot."

"It's not as simple as that, Mundungus."

"Not as simple? Not as simple? I noticed you avoided a trip to the North Sea."

Albus noted the wild look in Dung's eye was growing more intense. Initially, he thought it was due to Dung craving spirits, but his ordeal may have left him mentally unhinged. He suggested, "Maybe you need some time away."

"Away? My business has suffered terribly while I was incarcerated."

"Couldn't you set up business elsewhere?"

"Like where? Wales?"

"A bit further away, Dung. Wales is part of Great Britain."

"Cornwall then? You can't seriously have me consider Ireland."

"I meant somewhere further. Perhaps Albania?"

"Albania! What the hell is in Albania?"

"Mundungus ..."

"I don't want to hear it. I think I'm getting a raw deal here."

"What do you mean?"

"It means this is where we part ways. I can do a hell of a lot better on my own," Mundungus informed Albus. As he turned and walked away, he gave one last cry of, "Albania!" before disapparating.

Things were not going well, Albus had to admit to himself. Dung would be fine. He always was.

He was losing members of the Order faster than he could recruit them, and with Tom's boldness at Azkaban, along with whatever Horace was up to, he was gaining more followers or at least sympathizers every day.

* * *

As the fourteenth approached, Lily tried to find out from Severus what he wanted to do.

"With Valentine's Day being on a Tuesday, Sev, did you want to do something small that day, and then something really nice for the Hogsmeade weekend?"

"If that's what you want."

"Do you have anything in mind yet?"

"Not really. You don't like flowers. You want bars of Honeyduke's chocolate. That's pretty much it."

"I like flowers."

"What kind? You didn't like the ones I gave you last year."

"I did."

Severus just sighed. Let someone else transfigure flowers for days to get perfect roses and lilies. He did not count a good shag from Lily as a thank you. She could have said something then, rather than almost a year later. Lily also did not indicate she liked the necklace he gave her for her birthday. Perhaps she was paying him back for his lack of appreciation for the spice cake from the Hogwarts kitchen for his birthday earlier in the month. If he did not like it when he turned seventeen, it was easy to guess he would not like it one year later. Severus was not entirely ungrateful because Lily purchased him a new pair of shoes. She was a bit insulting about him still wearing Longbottom's, but they were an excellent pair of long-wearing footwear.

He was not feeling up to much at the moment because he had spent more time thinking about his parents since it was the beginning of February. Severus was angry that Sirius Black was imprisoned for such a short amount of time, and apparently little was being done to recapture him or the other Death Eaters. He may be getting closer to a substitute for phoenix tears to cut off Dumbledore's income, but it was hard to tell. He had started a correspondence with Healer Pye to inquire about more properties that she may be aware of, and to also prepare for possible testing, if he ever got a sample that could at least heal a cut on himself.

After being awoken on Valentine's Day before dawn for love making, Severus did present Lily with an abundance of pale pink roses and Honeyduke's chocolate. He had reconsidered and thought it would make for less trouble if he observed the holiday with traditional gifts. The dress robes and matching dark garnet ear bobs were ordered in January, prior to Lily's birthday. He had regretted the choice soon after placing the orders because it did not make sense for Lily have a second set of robes that complimented his. She had mentioned wanting a set with the dark bluish maroon when he bought his dress shirt, but she may have changed her mind. Lily said a lot of things she did not mean, or when something else caught her attention.

Lily gave him a single red rose, perfectly formed, and a new belt. If Severus was not Lily's boyfriend long enough, he might end up with more clothes than he ever owned before. He thanked her for the belt. It seemed a bit wasteful to have a new one, when he only had a few months of school left with no one attacking his uniforms. He preferred braces, when not in uniform, because his trousers felt more secure since his hips were barely wider than his waist.

On Saturday, following the before and after breakfast shagging, Severus and Lily queued up with the other students, including the Wilkes, going to Hogsmeade. It was not extremely cold nor windy, and Severus actually needed to take Lily to Gladrags to get those dress robes fitted. They were waiting there, rather than having Lily find them when she was looking through his things. He had to leave enough mail laying on his desk for her to find to keep her from looking too hard at other things.

As they crossed the unseen border of the Hogwarts grounds, where apparition became possible, the other grounds wide magic that prevented unwanted pregnancies was also no longer in effect. Since Lily had asked Severus to stop 'ruining the mood' by continually casting the simple contraception charm because she was casting a more powerful one monthly, there would be no reason for concern, except that Lily had not cast it since December when they were home for the Christmas holiday. She was relying on the contraceptive magic at the castle that Madam Pomfrey had told them about last year.

On the road to Hogsmeade as they walked with the Wilkes, inside Lily it was rather like the illustrations in the books and pamphlets, except not as colorfully pretty with little faces drawn on the sperms circling her egg.

They passed Honeydukes, crowded with both hands-holding couples and single students. The Three Broomsticks also had students waiting to enter queued outside the door.

Mary and Malcolm actually planned to celebrate upstairs in the Hog's Head so they bade Severus and Lily farewell and went off to go get filthy.

"So where to, Sev?" Lily asked.

He had already told Lily that her present was in Hogsmeade this morning, but now that they were so close to Gladrags, Severus was having doubts. What if she did not like the dress robes and earrings? Both Crouch and Regulus Black noticed Lily's reaction at her birthday party, and later told him that she might have expected something more now that he was so wealthy. They tried to vaguely tutor Severus on the fact that his shortcomings in other areas were supposed to be matched with an increase in material goods. They didn't come right out and say how ugly he was, but he had been this hideous prior to inheriting money from his parents' murderers and shown he was bright enough to actually earn money as something more than a servant. However, they did agree if Lily kept claiming they were good friends than Severus was not obligated to get her any costly jewelry.

When Severus did not answer her, Lily turned to look directly at him. There was a pained look on his face. Sev was not usually forgetful so she wondered if something had not gone right.

"What's wrong?"

"I … maybe you won't like it."

"What?"

His eyes shifted evasively for a number of seconds before he lowly admitted, "It was something you said last year … might not have meant it or changed your mind. I'm no good at this."

Lily made a face. Sev was getting all negative and moody when there was no reason. He never got her bad or inappropriate presents, even when he made them. In frustration, Lily complained, "I haven't even seen it yet, Sev. Let's go."

"Alright," he responded with a sullen slump to his shoulders, and walked beside Lily to Gladrags.

When they got there, and Lily saw the dress robes, a rich black fabric with dagged layers of that maroon Sev liked along with a deep, royal purple, she liked them. It might not be something she'd pick out for herself, however the outfit looked impressive.

Relieved that Lily did not refuse the robes and patiently allowed them to have a final fitting, Severus handed her the small hinged box flocked with black velvet with a gold hinge and clasp. Her eyes widened in delight as she took it from his hand, but he saw her disappointment when she opened it.

Earrings! What was Sev thinking? This was Valentine's Day. How did he reach eighteen and still be so clueless about holidays? Lily would expect something like earrings from her parents.

* * *

Remus had written back to James telling him he thought it was a bad idea to meet him in Hogsmeade. Prongs' was under the misconception that the Marauders were still beloved by most of the students and the legends of their pranks were still on everyone's lips.

The sixth year Gryffindors barely spoke to Remus now. They used to be favorite targets in the Gryffindor boys' baths of the Marauders until another year of younger students started. At least the lads remembered Remus never cast anything on them so they weren't openly hostile.

James ignored Moony's nonsense about no one fondly remembering him. He played professional quidditch for Merlin's sake, and he did it his way and blew off school and NEWTs to do it because he was a sensational chaser, playing professionally at only the age of seventeen.

They met at the Three Broomsticks, and James didn't care that Moony was trying to tell him that maybe a private room would be better. Why? He was here to talk about catching Sirius Black, and maybe convince Remus to give all this school nonsense up. It was laudable to want to finish his education, but really, who was going to hire Remus, even if he got a bunch of NEWTs?

Disappointed that Remus had not gotten a better lead on where Sirius could be hiding out, James was walking out of the pub with Moony next to him when he saw Evans. How perfect was that? He would gladly go back inside to have a butterbeer, or whatever she wanted, with her. He had hours before he was due at his parents for dinner before portkeying back to Portugal.

He saw Snape skulking slightly behind Evans, carrying her shopping. James cast a Jelly Legs Jinx at Snivelly for old times sake and asked, "Alright, Evans?"

Lily made a face of disgust. What the hell was Potter doing here? Didn't he have something else to do with himself after getting chucked out of school? Now the Gladrags bag was on the ground because he could not resist jinxing Severus. What a toerag. "Leave us alone, Potter." Noticing Lupin next to him, she added, "And you too, Lupin."

"Uh …." Remus was at a loss for an explanation. Prongs may not have any cares since he was already expelled, but Remus could get in big trouble.

"Piss off, Potter," growled Severus, reversing the jinx. He kept his eyes on Potter, but tried to see if there was a teacher around before hexing the dunderhead bald so he'd have no hair left to play with. Meeting Potter in the middle of Hogsmeade was no accident.

"Tsk, tsk, language," James replied, ready to cast a _scourgify _at Snape's mouth, but was interrupted by a horrible screeching noise. Some mangy old crow had winged into the middle of them and sounded like it was choking to death. It barely slowed its fall to the ground in front of his feet.

Severus knew Phi was alright. She claimed to have spotted a teacher. While she distracted Potter, Severus glanced quickly around. He saw a lot of students. There were no teachers.

When he saw James lean over to look at that raven, who Remus suspected was Snape's familiar but was not entirely sure, he warned him, "Don't ..."

Lily was also warning Potter, "Don't you ..."

Phi pecked sharply at the toe of one of Potter's dress shoes before launching upwards to get back in the air.

"Yow!" James exclaimed over his stabbed toe, now completely justified in putting this ugly feather duster out of its misery, however it leaped straight at his face and he fell backwards in surprise. Stupid bird was not going to get the better of him. It was such a bright, clear day that he could still clearly see it. "_Incend..."_

"_Expelliarmus."_

"Hey!"

"Mr. Potter, I will mail your wand to the Ministry," Prof. Flitwick informed him. "And I will include a full explanation about you intentionally waiting in Hogsmeade to attack Hogwarts' students. Mr. Lupin, you will return to the castle with me."

"But …," Remus protested.

"I realize it is tradition for the students to go to Hogsmeade the Saturday after Valentine's Day, but you did choose to accompany your old friend while he proved that he has not learned a single thing since he was a student."

Severus realized why he did not see a teacher. From his vantage point, he could not see Flitwick among the students while Phi could from overhead. Likewise, it was doubtful Flitwick saw Potter cast anything at him. Potter would tell some idiotic story about how Severus deserved whatever he got, and he'd get patted on the back while Dumbledore reversed his decision and admitted Potter back to Hogwarts as a hero. Was Potter going to continue lurking around ready to hit him with a jinx his whole life? He bent down to pick up Lily's new robes, still boxed and bagged, wondering why he even bothered with anything.

"How about a butterbeer, Evans?" James invited, not the least bit deterred.

"No," Lily replied, already heading down the street towards Hogwarts.

"But Evans …"

"Go away."

Severus noted that she was not even bothering to see if he was following. He could be a prick and head the other way, but there was nothing that he wanted to do in Hogsmeade. Why couldn't Lily have flounced off towards the Hog's Head? With a sigh over his decision to return to Hogwarts anyway, he gave Potter some fast-growing toenails nonverbally while some other students accosted him. They were braver when Potter did not have his wand, or Lupin to back him up.

He caught up to Lily who had stopped to wait for him.

"Sorry, Sev. Are you alright?"

"Yes."

"Potter's such a toerag. He's seventeen or eighteen now. Why does he keep doing this stuff like he's a first year?"

"Criminal mentality?"

Lily then launched into her analysis of Potter which lasted the entire walk up to the castle and through it up to the fourth floor to their rooms. Severus may revisit Potter in his mind to formulate new strategies to protect himself, but he never walked around talking about them.

He did not want people thinking he was obsessed with Potter or Black. Or Dumbledore. Or even Slughorn. Severus should not forget about Slughorn. Potter proved that even if his enemies, even those that claimed they merely attacked him because they couldn't stand the sight of his greasy, big-nosed, ugly person, no longer saw him on a daily basis or could avoid him entirely, they'd still return to harass, hurt and embarrass him for fun.

Severus put the robes down on the sofa for Lily to do as she pleased. With Potter, Lily talking about Potter for close to thirty minutes, and before that Lily not happy with anything he did, Severus chose to retreat to his room and lie down.

Lily had thought Severus was right behind her when she went into her room to get his gift. It was not a large box, but she had wrapped it very nicely for him in red paper with hearts and a ribbon and extravagant bow that was clearly a charm, since no one, not even Petunia, could get one that elaborate without magic.

Tired of waiting for him, she went into the common room and instead of finding Severus, she saw her bag from Gladrags by itself. Those robes were really beautiful. All that black made her skin look paler, but in a dramatic sort of way. She just had to stay out of the sun to keep freckles off her face.

She tried the robes on again with the earrings and a pair of black shoes. Lily was considering all the clothing she'd have to clean out in late June when she was home and combined both her home clothes with her old school clothes, besides her wizarding outfits. She'd need more robes. Not dress robes, but everyday stuff.

After she put everything away, Lily was starting to wonder what happened to Severus. Was he miffed because she had not carried his present to Hogsmeade? Why did Sev have to be so moody sometimes? Or maybe not, he was probably back with his arithmancy and potions, and forgotten all about their big day together.

She knocked on his bedroom door, calling, "Sev?"

After a moment, she heard his reply, "What?"

"What are you doing?"

"Lying down."

"Lying down?"

"Yes," he replied loud enough for her to hear through the door.

Severus had been lying on his bed thinking about the loss of his parents, the unlikeliness of Lily ever being more than his best friend and lover whenever she found it convenient. He also found more people he definitely disliked at Hogwarts than those he cared to converse with.

Lily opened the door, asking, "Why are you lying down? Are you sick?"

"Not really."

Severus had hardly anything lit in here. She did see he was lying on his side so she went over to the huge bed, asking, "What's wrong?"

"Nothing."

Lily frowned. Severus' eyes looked a bit too shiny, but he did not appear to be crying. She sat down on the bed next to him, put her hand on his arm and commented, "Potter?"

"No," he replied sullenly. Potter was a problem, but if he persisted, Severus could take care of him.

"You did the right thing, Sev. If you cast something at him, you'd be the one in trouble."

Potter. Why did Lily want to keep talking about Potter? They weren't having much of a Valentine's Day celebration anyway since she did not like his gifts. Things had been better when he had no money, and Lily had no expectations.

After giving Severus plenty of time to reply, Lily held out the wrapped present towards his face and said, "I had your gift in my room."

"Oh."

"Take it."

Severus shifted to sit up and took the cube from Lily. He was no good at guessing what wrapped things were. It was weighty.

Since Lily was waiting, he unwrapped it. A wooden box with a glass sphere thing inside. He took it out. Only the top was rounded, the bottom was sort of like a child's top. It had colorful things in the glass dome. Oh … a sneakoscope.

"Thank you."

"It's alright?" Lily asked. Barty Crouch (Jr.) had recommended it. His fellow Slytherins thought more like Sev. Severus was also practical so she couldn't just pick anything, even a book.

"Yes," he replied. Severus had some vague knowledge that there were poor ones and good ones, but he doubted Lily would intentionally purchase a poor one. She probably went for one that was the prettiest. "We just need someone to get up to something around it to try it out."

"Maybe we can do something with the Defense group."

"No, it'll work better if no one knows I have it."

A sneakoscope was uncertain since it would also signal when the target had nothing planned against Severus, but against others or just up to no good in general. Actually, what Severus really wanted was a foe glass. He should check all the mirrors at the Lestrange houses. People like that had a lot of enemies, too much money, and more items than they could ever use.

"So why are you back in bed before dinner, Sev?" Lily omitted the 'without me' that was in her mind. Something was bothering him. It was probably Potter. He wouldn't want to admit that James Potter still bothered him.

"I don't feel like doing anything, Lily."

"Why not?"

"It's everything. My parents, you, Hogwarts … I can't do anything right."

Lily had no reply regarding Sev's parents. Their deaths still bothered him, especially his mother's. Lily understood it somewhat due to her father dying, but she thought he was wasting too much time dwelling over it since they weren't very good parents. Things were much better for Severus now. And Hogwarts? Sev was head boy. What more did he want? This stupid arithmancy and potions project of his was going nowhere, and now he was blaming everything around him for his disappointment. The couple of early successes had gone to his head.

She put her arms around him, murmuring, "Don't worry about all that, Sev."

Severus was relieved that Lily wasn't offering falsehoods to assure him that she loved everything about him.

Together they shifted to lay down, holding each other and lay quietly.

* * *

Lily had been using cheering charms on Severus. He was a bit annoyed, but it got him out of bed and to class, along with continuing to work on his project to undermine Dumbledore. It did not change anything. People hated him. People wanted him dead. People went out of their way to mock and make fun of him. Lily found him convenient, nothing more.

It was while he was still giddy from a charm that he got into a lengthy conversation with Summerby in the library. He knew she was smart, liked to read, and was interested in a lot of the things he was.


	56. Chapter 56 Lily makes a decision

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AU LE/SS

Snape's Worst Memory

Just a reminder from chapter 55:

As they crossed the unseen border of the Hogwarts grounds, where apparition became possible, the other grounds wide magic that prevented unwanted pregnancies was also no longer in effect. Since Lily had asked Severus to stop 'ruining the mood' by continually casting the simple contraception charm because she was casting a more powerful one monthly, there would be no reason for concern, except that Lily had not cast it since December when they were home for the Christmas holiday. She was relying on the contraceptive magic at the castle that Madam Pomfrey had told them about last year.

On the road to Hogsmeade as they walked with the Wilkes, inside Lily it was rather like the illustrations in the books and pamphlets, except not as colorfully pretty with little faces drawn on the sperms circling her egg.

And now on with the next chapter ~

**Chapter 56 Lily makes a decision**

Severus realized he did not want to be alone, but fate had dealt him a terrible hand. The girls he was attracted to were too good for him. Lily certainly knew that, and had not minced words about her plans to leave him. He still loved her, and probably always would. There were mornings he woke before her, and was content to lie next to Lily looking at her. Short of slipping her love potion, which would be terribly obvious considering the way she treated him as only her good friend in public, Severus did not know what he could do.

Over the weeks, Severus got a plan together in his head. He'd want to concentrate on his apprenticeship after they graduated and Lily left him. He had asked her twice now since Christmas break what she planned on doing, but she would not tell him. Lily claimed she did not know. He guessed she did not want him following or impeding her in some way.

When Lily hit him with a cheering charm, he'd think about Summerby. He could write her next year, while she was in her seventh year at Hogwarts. When he came off his high, he considered writing would also give her a whole year for the opportunity to find someone better suited than him.

Then one morning, Lily was sick before their first class. He suspected someone had tampered with the food at the Gryffindor table, and told Lily when she asked that it was not him. Why would he chance making Lily nauseous? All that bacon and sausage smelled bad enough before she ate it.

When whoever, probably a younger Gryffindor because they thought they were so witty, got Lily a second morning in the same week, Severus brewed up something that would protect the drinker against further pranking.

It was not until Lily was at home for Easter break that she was sick again because she saw no reason to drink that potion in her own house. Sev was staying overnight at Spinner's End, even though mum claimed it was too cold.

Lily had a disagreement with him before they left school. Severus was looking at those Lestrange houses to find one that might be alright for Mary with a secure basement that was not too disgusting, and then he was going to offer to sell it to the Wilkes. He had talked to Malcolm and Mary and made the decision without consulting her. What if it was the house Lily liked best? Severus still had not taken her to see any of them. What if he did not sell it for enough money? Mary had money, and she thought Malcolm had some too. Sev already gave them house elves so he should not short change himself by selling a house to them for too cheap too. He was letting them take advantage of him.

Mrs. Evans was not so convinced of Lily's explanation that someone at school had done something to her. Of course since Lily knew everything, her explanations about monthly potions and enchantments to deny there was any chance that this could be something as mundanely muggle as a pregnancy did not reassure her. The simplest way to disprove that would be Lily never doing that sort of thing. However, she was cursed by a werewolf, had no will power, and bullied Severus.

Lily had some more of that potion and felt better, but her mother mentioned her illness to Severus when he came over for dinner.

"Severus, any idea of why Lily would still be ill at home?"

"You're sick again?" Severus asked Lily.

"Yes, but it could be something that got slipped to me before I left Hogwarts."

"Do you have a bezoar? That'll clear up anything."

"I'm not poisoned."

"Might be to keep you ill for days."

"Could it be something else?" Mrs. Evans suggested.

Lily rolled her eyes and snipped, "No."

Not knowing what Mrs. Evans meant, Severus inquired, "Like what?"

"Morning sickness."

Seeing that Severus was not sure what that was, Lily added, "Mum's trying to suggest I'm pregnant."

"Not if you cast that charm correctly each month," he replied, but Lily did notice his eyes focus briefly on her midsection.

"There's also the magic at the castle."

"I wouldn't count on that. The headmaster can lift any of the enchantments, like allowing apparition."

"Why would he do that?" Lily snarled, then already began to consider that Dumbledore did whatever he liked.

"He might find it funny," Severus muttered, then changed his tone, "I'll go home and get a bezoar, and that book of my mother's to check this other possibility."

"Why?" Lily asked.

"The more things we eliminate, the closer we come to figuring out what's wrong," he answered.

"Can it wait till after dinner?" Mrs. Evans asked. "It's ready."

"Yes, it can. I had some of that potion you mixed up for me, Sev."

"If you're sure," he replied. "Apparating is quick."

"After dinner," Lily stated. She was still thinking about Dumbledore. What kind of toerag would fool around with the antipregnancy charm on Hogwarts? Students were snogging and shagging all over the castle. Didn't have to be a prefect or head girl to know that. No, he couldn't be that much of an idiot, and no, she was not pregnant.

Severus was still under the assumption that it was some sort of poison. The quick charm to verify that Lily was not pregnant was merely a formality for her mother. Lily was very good at charms so he highly doubted she miscast a contraception spell.

He slipped out to the back garden while the ladies had dessert to apparate back to Spinner's End and was back before they had finished clearing the table.

Lily was rattling the bezoar around the inside of her mouth, when Severus made a face after casting a spell out of that book at her. She took the stone out and asked, "What?"

She saw his eyes look sideways towards her mother, then he said, "You can look up whatever you want, Lily," and shut the book.

His mind was already racing in circles. How did Lily mess up the charm? Could she have done it on purpose? No, why would she do something like that? He had heard some tales of girls getting pregnant on purpose, but Lily did not need to do that with him. When Dumbledore messed with the magic at Hogwarts, did he also cast something specifically at Lily to ruin her contraception charm? Was Lily going to use the safer potion method to rid herself of it? Was he even the father?

Lily handed Severus back his bezoar. Why didn't Sev find some better cure for poisons? From the stomach of a goat. Yuck. Was he kidding around about the spell to detect pregnancy? That wasn't funny.

"Well?" Mrs. Evans asked. She had been hoping for something … to see.

"Since Lily took a potion earlier, that needs to wear off before we know if the bezoar was effective," Severus stated. Bezoars had nothing to do with what Lily had, but he did not know if Lily wanted to tell her mother anything. She could end this pregnancy before the week was out.

He had been edging back into the kitchen, then muttered, "Maybe I should be going."

When Mrs. Evans said good night, he exited through the back door, but Lily called, "Sev, wait," and followed him outside.

"What?"

"Were you kidding?"

"About what?"

"When you cast that charm?"

"No." After a pause, Severus added, "If you need help getting ingredients, let me know."

"Ingredients for what?"

"Whatever you choose to do."

"What do you mean?"

"The last time, you said you did not want to be pregnant. You have things to do, people to meet, and whatever you have planned, Lily."

"But what about you?"

"Me? What do you mean?"

"Is that what you want?"

"You upset me enough last time, Lily. I don't want to repeat this."

"Repeat what? I don't know what you're talking about."

"Never mind then," Severus replied, turning to continue to the back of the garden.

"Wait, you didn't say what you wanted to do."

"Since when do you consider what I want?"

"Why are you getting angry with me, Sev?"

"Because if I say what I'd prefer, you wouldn't care."

"What makes you say that?"

"You are constantly hurting me. Nothing I do is good enough for you."

"When did I say that?"

"You don't say those words. It's when you don't care what I do for you, or you think I'm not worth a decent answer when I ask you to marry me, or when you forgot a contraception charm and panicked that you'd have a hideous baby that would also ruin your plans to spend the next decade shagging every wizard you met."

"What? I never said anything like that."

"I do not want to argue."

"Well, how can you not expect me to tell you you're wrong, Sev?"

"Then set me straight. What is it you want to do?"

"I don't know," Lily replied, exasperation thick in her voice. Why was Severus the one having a meltdown? She was the one that was pregnant. Probably because Dumbledore thought it would be an amusing prank to have a whole bunch of girls running to Madam Pomfrey. Noticing that Severus continued to walk to behind their shed, she yelled, "Wait, you're just leaving?"

"What do you want me to do, Lily?"

"Can't we talk about this?"

"I believe we have been. I told you if it is a repeat of what happened before, I'd rather not listen to it again. I will not hinder you from doing what you feel is best for yourself, but there's no reason for you to list why you are doing it. I remember what you've said in the past, and it was hurtful."

"I don't know what you thought you heard me say, Sev, but this has never come up before. This is serious, and you've got to face it like an adult."

Severus crossed his arms over his chest and replied, "Then say it, I'm here and I'm listening."

"What? You want me to do all the talking? Don't you have an opinion?"

"My opinion …?" Severus paused, then continued, "What more do you need to hear? I tell you I love you and can't imagine marrying anyone else. That I fear that something will happen to you and I'll be left alone, and you give me a litany of excuses. You either tell me I'm wrong, that you have too much planned to have any time for me, or that you'd prefer to search for someone else because I am not good enough."

"Then why do you put up with me?" Lily retorted.

"I don't know what else to do. Without you, I think I'd be miserable."

Lily put her hands on her hips and sniped, "It sounds like I make you pretty miserable already."

"No, you aggravate me now … at times. Sometimes, things are quite lovely between us."

Mulishly, Lily crossed her arms over her chest, then refrained from using a challenging tone as she asked, "What would you like to do about this, Sev?"

"That depends. If my feelings for you are one-sided, and this will interfere with your plans, then I see little point in considering any long-term solution. There's a number of ways to end a pregnancy in that book."

That was a solution that offered no chance for her to change her mind, Lily considered. Once it was done, it was done. Although Severus was saying it calmly, he had prefaced it with the proviso that she did not feel something for him. Without Severus, she'd be dead. He had been her friend for close to ten years. Her world used to revolve around Petunia. Sure, she had been young and Tunie was her big sister who knew everything. Then Severus popped out of a bush and talked about all sorts of other things that turned out to be true. Severus still knew a lot of stuff that he had to tell her. Some of it was dull, but he was sure to have plenty more interesting things. They could also have some fun, even though Sev was too cautious.

Love though? Lily knew Severus loved her. He didn't just say it casually. She recalled that month when she might have been turned into a werewolf. He did not care if she was cursed or not. He had not retaliated when she ignored him at school either. Severus would probably do almost anything for her, if he had a chance to discuss it. It was that darned Slytherin in him that got him questioning the inconsequential things. Or wait … maybe not. He had dressed up as a woman for Halloween for her … or was that his idea? Sometimes when they agreed, it was hard to tell who originally thought of something. Weren't Slytherins supposed to be selfish and sneaky, stealing credit and whatever else wasn't nailed down? Severus was nothing like that. Well, maybe as far as the Marauders were concerned, but they had it coming. She didn't even think he bothered with Lupin, even though the opportunity was right in front of him at Hogwarts.

Did Lily love Severus? She supposed she did. Not wildly and passionately, running across the top of a picturesque seaside cliff to jump into his arms sort of business. That was a movie type thing. She did like the way he touched her and all their stuff in and out of the bedroom. By now, she considered Severus to be her best friend, but was not sure if she was his. Sev kept secrets from her. Though on the other hand, he was sort of boring because when he told her what he was doing, he actually did it. He did not lie to her. From listening to Petunia and her mother over their shows, that seemed to be a big problem with men.

"So uh … now I really have to make a decision then?"

After a pause, Severus responded, "Having children and marriage can be separate. You really want nothing to do with me after the end of June?"

"What? No. I never said that, Sev. I'm not sure what I'm doing, and you seem to have some direction."

"Nothing is truly finalized. I've suggested to the one potions master that I become his apprentice though I keep considering leaving England since things are volatile with all the killings and lawlessness."

"But your house is here, those new places, well, new to you, Gringotts, and everyone you know."

"Most people I know, I do not like. Gringotts is not restricted to this country either."

"Oh, right. Um, I don't want to make a hasty decision about this. I'll look over that book tonight. Can you come round early tomorrow? I'll tell mum you're coming for breakfast."

"Alright." Severus had some things planned for tomorrow, but this was definitely more important. What would he do if Lily said no to everything … the baby, marriage, him? He had not planned on her final decision for at least three months, maybe four.

When he went home he gave a brief thought to Summerby. Severus had nothing with her other than conversations about school related things. She might only be pleasant to him because he was head boy now. He had not noticed her in prior years so there was no attraction between them.

He had been considering that Lily would tell him 'yes' then insist on a long engagement in order to give herself time to change her mind. That would be an improvement on things since Lily would have to admit Severus was more than her friend from school. Not a great improvement, but at least he thought that would make him feel better.

So what if she said some form of 'no' tomorrow? Would that finally give him to courage to tell Lily that he was tired of it? His ultimatum about his marriage proposal had not resulted in anything. She had called his bluff. Not in so many words, but there should be a reasonable and logical limit to how long someone could consider that a valid offer, especially since all the conditions she listed had been met.

It was a sleepless night of thinking and considering different responses that he could give to everything he could imagine Lily saying. Then he sunk into the same rut and considered every mistake he had made since the day he first met Lily on the playground.

By dawn, Severus had surmised there was a defect in his personality, along with everything else that was wrong with him, that kept him close to people that hurt him. He could consider Lily sort of like his parents. That was the best similarity he could come up with. He did not choose his parents, they did not get all weepy and hug each other, but nonetheless he loved them. That must be how he loved Lily. She could say terrible things and hurt him like no one else could, but it was difficult to consider taking revenge on her other than with small annoyances to try to assert himself and validate his self-worth. It would sound ludicrously pathetic to anyone, but that's the best way he could express it. Luckily, he had no one to talk to. Unless he talked to Phi … and he never wanted to turn into one of those wizards that talked to their nonspeaking familiar all the time.

It did cross his mind as he walked up to their back door that Mrs. Evans could hate him now too. Lily's mother did not behave any differently though when she let him in. Did that mean Lily felt there was no reason to tell her anything?

Lily was already downstairs at the kitchen table. Not really eating, just pushing her porridge around while she waited for Sev.

He joined her at the table since Petunia was no longer living here or currently visiting. She'd have a definite opinion regarding this situation. Lily's greeting was subdued, and he noticed she kept glancing at him before turning her attention back to her bowl whenever he looked her way.

Severus wished she'd say something one way or the other. Lily was not looking at him as though she hated him, but if fingers were going to be pointed, there were others that should be listed first. Perhaps they needed to continue using the one-time contraception charms if Dumbledore messed with the more convenient longer-lasting ones. Who would have guessed Dumbledore would have lifted the school-wide charm? That's why Severus was so suspicious of Lily's charm failing.

On the other hand, if they were having a baby, getting married or both, wouldn't Lily have mentioned something to her mother? Why was he even still thinking of those options … and without one of those damned cheering charms of Lily's? No, she more than likely decided to brew one of the potions. How did those even work? Did it disappear without any mess or pain, or did something pour out?

Seeing a thoughtful expression on his face, Lily murmured, "I thought I should discuss it with you, before we involve mum."

"Involve?"

Since Severus was thinking of how messy things could be, he did not respond with the positive tone that Lily was hoping for.

"Yes," she replied, hardening her look into a glare. From Sev's confused look, Lily wondered how he could be clueless. Annoyed, Lily stood and demanded, "Come on."

"Alright," he replied, but took the time to bring half-eaten bowl to the sink, rather than immediately following Lily out of the kitchen.

Lily only went as far as the lounge to wait for him to catch up, then whispered, "You do know what I'm talking about, right?"

He nodded, then added, "But not your decision."

"I'm getting to that. From what I was reading, is this book even … legitimate?"

"I think so. We can wait to check the school library."

"No, I …" Lily then stopped to sigh before continuing, "it's just that it warns that there's a chance, depending upon how frail my constitution is, that I might no longer be able to have children, if I go messing about."

"That would be worth some further research," Severus said by way of agreement. He thought the frail constitution part might refer to the more inbred purebloods who could barely have one child, even with the aid of magic. There was also a small part of him that snidely wanted to give Lily the choice between having his repulsive child or no children. If he suggested such a thing out loud, she'd probably angrily decide none.

"Maybe not. I mean … there's you … there's me … and we get along. I can't think of meeting someone else that … I don't know, I mean I am friendly, but you're dependable, you know?"

Dependable? He was dependable? Severus was disappointed that Lily chose that as his strongest virtue.

"So, I was thinking that even with your quirks, I should not be doing so much thinking about what if sometime in the future out of the blue some fellow turns into my Prince Charming because you already humor me, when I'm in that kind of mood."

"Either tell the truth, Lily, or start lying and give me a few compliments."

"I'm getting to that … and I will not be lying."

"At the moment it sounds like you are telling me I scored well on one of those magazine quizzes of Tunie's."

Lily laughed. Those were the stupidest things, and any idiot could guess what was the best answer to each question.

"What I'm trying to say, Sev, is that your my best friend, are mature most of the time, don't go off doing toerag things, unless I don't know about it, and that's what I love about you."

Severus waited. Lily loved that he was not a Gryffindor? That he did not spend the day worrying over his quidditch team? That he would rather read a book than polish his broom? That he did not find a joke shop to be heaven on earth? If only all witches found those traits desirable, he would be the most popular wizard in England, nay, the entire breadth of the British Empire.

"Well?" Lily asked.

Sarcastically he replied, "Your compliments have left me speechless."

Lily huffed, "What? I'm saying that you are a great guy, you numbskull. What are you going to say next? I know? I'm telling you that you and I are good together, and I want us to be together always. How's that?"

Pushing his luck, Severus replied, "I know."

"So can I tell mum that we're getting married, since you don't seem to have anything constructive to say?"

"Should we make it seem a little more romantic for her? Your matter of fact attitude is off putting."

"Romantic?"

"A sort of formal repetition of the proposal, flowers and a ring? I can even do the kneeling thing for you."

"Nah, I think she knows what's going on already."

His eyebrows rose. How could anyone know? He barely knew, and Lily couldn't say anything of value.

"We should tell her, just to confirm she's got it right. So I know … are there any details yet about when and where?"

"Uh … I've only made up my mind, Sev."

"Alright, but while you're doing the list, I would like a pressure cooker."

"You don't get anything. You're the groom."

"I don't get anything? Why not?"

"It's tradition, Sev."

Severus frowned. He had to buy gifts when he attended weddings, but now that he was getting married, those people that he invited gave him nothing? He felt cheated. It was perfectly fine with him if this would be the last wedding he ever attended.

He trudged behind Lily as she went back to the kitchen. Now that her mind was made up, Lily made it sound like something he didn't even recognize when she broke the news to her mother. The only bit of truth was Lily admitting that she was pregnant … and possibly the part of them getting married. Lily had time to change her mind since it was not happening right now.

Having been disappointed so many times, Severus did not catch the excitement that Lily infused into the discussion with her mother.

It did not take long for it to turn into an argument. Not about him as the groom, but Lily's ideas. Severus could not say much of anything since he agreed with Mrs. Evans. If Lily wanted to be married in roughly three months, or the weekend following graduation, planning a large wedding was out of the question. His only contribution to that discussion was that Lily needed to study for NEWTs at the same time.

The idea of getting married in the same church as Petunia, well, Mrs. Evans was not amenable to that either. The church gives the date, not the bride. She could call and see what they had available, but the bigger problem was Severus. He did not practice any religion. Lily countered that he could lie, but Severus pointed out that the Snapes lived in this town.

Lily started the conflict with her mother over the number of guests, but it transformed into involving Severus.

"Lily, you need to realize it costs money to afford hundreds of people ..."

"Petunia had ..."

"Your father is no longer with us. I have some money, but I can't spend ..."

"Severus has money. Right, Sev?"

"I suppose," he replied.

"See, mum?"

"The bride's family ..."

"I don't care about that tradition crap if it prevents me from having a nice wedding."

"Lily ..."

Severus interrupted, "I don't mind, Mrs. Evans. You have seemed like family to me for years now."

"Thank you, Severus, but you aren't understanding ..."

"Mum, he said yes. Leave it alone."

"The expenses can grow astronomically," Mrs. Evans continued. "Things are quite expensive for the type of wedding you have in mind."

"Mum, stop. Can I use Petunia's guest list to start my own, and then I'll add to it?"

"I can understand friends of the family, Lily, but with you away so often, I don't think most of your sister's guests would expect to be invited to your wedding."

"I'm only having one wedding, mum, and I want a good one."

Running out of patience, her mother responded, "Then you shouldn't have gone messing around and now need to rush things, young lady. All it takes to get married is a few forms, tests, filing the application and a fee. Shouldn't you save some money for the baby, rather than blowing it to throw a big party where you're the center of attention?"

What tests? Severus asked himself.

Lily crossed her arms over her chest and complained, "Why aren't you happy for me?"

Severus sighed.

"You're not doing this in the proper order," reminded her mother. "I'm against the idea of a big wedding because by then, your dress will show off why you're getting married."

"Not if I wear robes."

"Aren't you inviting muggles?" Severus asked. That's who was at Petunia's wedding.

"Yes," Lily replied in an annoyed tone. Wasn't Severus paying attention?

"You need to decide one way or the other. Robes are not worn at muggle weddings."

Lily made a face, then said, "Stop trying to mess me up, Sev."

"I'm only pointing out that you are making hasty decisions."

"Oh, so now I'm being hasty, am I?"

"If you plan too much without realizing that there may be something you overlooked, you aren't going to be happy."

Mrs. Evans reiterated, "I am against the idea of a big wedding, Lily. Anyone with sense will realize later that you were somewhat pregnant at the time."

"This is 1978, not 1878."

Severus saw little point in staying to listen to the two of them argue, so he interrupted, "I'll go then?"

"What?" Lily demanded.

"It appears the general scope of this is in question … I don't know much about muggle weddings, having only attended one."

"Do you have a rough idea of the number of guests you'd invite, Severus?" Mrs. Evans asked.

"You two are the muggles I know, oh, and Petunia and Vernon."

"That's all?"

"Come on, Sev, you can invite your friends. They can try to act normal."

"I know you'd like to invite the Wilkes too, but you may want to check the date against the lunar calendar."

"Oh, right. I can't ask Mary to be in the wedding party, if she's not feeling well. Who else, Sev?"

"Around muggles? Uh, I don't think I'd want Upsilon even around wizards if he refuses to speak English. He's moody and sometimes tries to start arguments to amuse himself."

"The Ancient Rune nutter?"

Severus shrugged, then added, "Prof. Abstractus cannot be around muggles. He's too obvious. And I'm not sure about Mr. Filch."

Lily's mouth dropped open. Was Severus joking about inviting Mr. Filch to their wedding? "The caretaker?" she clarified.

"He did teach me things when he did not have to, and sent a nice letter when my mother died."

Getting worried that Severus really had no one to invite, Lily asked, "What about the people you write to? Longbottom?"

"I suppose. We did go to his wedding. I'm not sure about Lovegood. He may also be one to start some verbal confrontation with other guests."

Lily nodded. So the Wilkes and the Longbottoms. That was four. Four more than his initial zero. She knew Sev could do better. Mum was probably aggravating him. "Alright, can you work on a better list, Sev?"

"That's it."

"No, it isn't."

"Then why are you bothering to ask me?"

"Because you haven't mentioned any of your friends."

"Who? I have you, but it seems you don't even know me at times. I have no other friends."

"Every Friday and Saturday ..."

"Other students study with the head boy and head girl, at your insistence. They are getting something out it, and it's not my friendship."

"Not Mary and Malcolm."

"She owes me a life debt. If I don't protect her from her own Gryffindor stupidity, she'll end up in Azkaban or dead."

"What … you … you're helping her because of that debt?"

"You'd be upset if anything else happened to her."

With a huff, Lily dismissively replied, "If you're going to be this way, you might as well go."

"Alright."

"Wait …" she cried when he got to the door. "When are you coming back? And when can I look at the houses?"

"Do you want me back tomorrow or sooner? What do you mean houses?"

"So you don't go selling the one I want to live in."

Severus looked confused as he repeated her rephrased question back to her, "Where you're living? Where are you going to live? Before or … you don't plan on living with me after we're married?"

"What are you talking about?"

"I live at Spinner's End, when I'm not in school. I was going to live at Damocles' during my apprenticeship, but I was going to write him about this … change … about living at home instead. If he doesn't want me as an apprentice, that'll be fine with me, but I thought you would live with me. If you're not, than why are we bothering with this?"

Mrs. Evans was as confused as Severus about this and crossed her arms over her chest to hear how her daughter was going to explain this. If Lily did not want to live with Severus, she could live here, but if she did not plan to live with Severus, why marry him?

"Stop being a ninny, I'm talking about those places you inherited with the rude house elves."

"I'm not living there."

"Not now, but you could."

"But I won't," he replied in the same snotty tone Lily just used.

"Why not?"

"I'm going to sell them all. I don't want them."

"But where are you going to live?"

"I didn't need a place to live … till this came up," he added a wave of his hand in Lily's direction. "We can rent someplace, if you don't want to live in Spinner's End."

"Rent? But you own other houses."

"And I am telling you that I will never live in them."

Mrs. Evans interjected, "Perhaps all the wedding planning should be put aside till this is settled? If you are only marrying Severus because you have the intention of living at some posh location, Lily, ..."

"Mum, I don't know if they're posh yet. Severus won't even let me see them. As your fiancée, it does not bode well that you are keeping things from me."

"My fiancée of barely an hour yet. You are not exactly oozing sincerity on this subject either. If I do not want to live in a house that belonged to murderers, and that every sneak thief that fancies himself above the law breaks in to ransack, please consider that my opinion may have some merit, rather than some punishment I am meting out to make your life a living hell."

Mrs. Evans was happy Severus was showing some backbone with Lily. She understood perfectly what he was saying. Why couldn't Lily try to compromise? He did offer to rent someplace while he was continuing his education.

"I'm not living in Spinner's End," Lily announced. Some of what Severus said did make sense, but she was not going to agree to live like the Snapes.

"It is close to this address," he reminded her.

"So?"

"In less than a year, with the baby, wouldn't you want to be near your mother?"

"I can always come here for a visit."

"Babies have a lot of things to haul around, Lily. It would be simpler for me to visit you."

"You hardly drive now, mum."

"Let me write Damocles. This may be a moot point."

"Wait, were we going to get my ring?"

"Can it wait till this afternoon?" Severus inquired. He needed a break from Lily's demands.

"Yes, it can."

Lily was already recrossing her arms over her chest after Severus left, when her mother said, "He could still call it off, Lily."

"What? Why would Sev call it off? He's asked me to marry him for years. You don't know anything about it."

"Just because he was willing to marry you before you got pregnant does not indicate that you were willing to reciprocate and marry him while he was poor."

"I will no longer be pregnant by Christmas, mum, being poor was the least of my objections. We're in school, we both have plans to further our education to become experts in our fields, and I knew there were had to be more mature wizards then the lot I met at Hogwarts."

Mrs. Evans had already lifted her hand to her mouth and repeated, "By Christmas? That's right. First Christmas already. This is happening so fast, Lily."

"First … oh, yeah, well, don't worry about me moving too far away or anything."

"It's a sensible suggestion. Maybe if this fellow insists Severus live at his home during the week, or for a few months, it would be best for you to continue living here."

Lily's eyebrows crept up as the corner of her mouth drew up in a sneer. "Live here? If I have a husband, I don't need to live here. Sev said he'd rent someplace. What would people think? I'm going to get big … I can't live here."

"I don't think Severus knows anything about babies, Lily. As a matter of fact, you don't know much either. You never had any jobs watching other children, like Petunia."

"She stood around, talking with her girlfriends at the park, while they played."

Mrs. Evans shook her head and sighed. Lily was going to be a trial, both for a wedding and having a baby. She didn't know how Severus put up with this.

By the time the two of them returned to Hogwarts, Lily had an engagement ring of noticeable size on her finger. It did not need to flash different colors, sing or spout poetry to draw attention to it.

She had also decided a small wedding might be best since she did not like most of the people that Petunia had invited to hers. If she restricted the muggles to her family, she could wear loose-fitting robes to cover her abdomen and invite her friends, and whoever she considered to be favorable acquaintances of Sev's.

Severus voiced his opinion that this Damocles fellow seemed a bit lax, since he replied favorably that Severus could live wherever he liked. Ilkley Moor was within apparition distance of their homes so Severus would not have to rent someplace far from her mother's. Mrs. Evans still felt they could live with her until things were further settled, but Lily was insistent that she was old enough to take care of a house.

Between them and a few charms, they had also determined that the headmaster purposely messed with the anti-pregnancy magic around Valentine's Day. Lily did not admit to Severus that she had not cast a longer lasting charm since this was really all Dumbledore's fault.


	57. Chapter 57 Selective Defense

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AN: Poll closed for next story. More teen snape. Results are viewable through my author profile.

I'm pissy because I had to reimage my hard drive. I had a sudden Windows crash and was unable to recover so I did not get a chance to save my most recent files to my external hard drives. My last save was a couple weeks old so it was not a huge disaster.

AU LE/SS

**Snape's Worst Memory**

**Chapter 57 Selective Defense**

Severus was willing to let Lily do her planning with little input from him. She changed her mind so often, and perversely wanted the opposite of what he suggested in other matters, that Lily might as well just inform him of where to stand for the wedding. If there was one. He still knew that she could change her mind regarding that too. There was no need for him to throw away his NEWT scores because of Lily's whims. As the days passed, bringing their graduation and supposed wedding closer, he started to wonder if it was going to happen, but then sobered as he felt hope build in him. Hope was pointless and a waste of time.

Lily was growing into the idea of becoming Mrs. Severus Snape. It had been in her head for a while, since he first asked, but now it was so close to becoming real. After picking out the most annoyingly large ring that made no sound, she could not forget because it was always there on her hand.

Severus kept refocusing her attention on NEWTs. Like her wedding, there would only be one chance. Or like their child. She spared some time to read a little on that. There were a lot of books in the library, but there was nothing more exciting than previous things she had read. Sev had let her hold onto his mother's book.

What was annoying her more was Sev's lack of interest in the baby. He would watch her cast charms to see it. There was not much to see yet, but then he'd go back to studying, or some homework, or his damned arithmancy, or then he'd be back in his loo, working on another potion experiment. Lily even woke during the night to find the bed empty, and him chopping up something in the lavatory to start another cauldron.

She did ask him at least once a day about names for boys and girls, but he had no interest in that either. Sometimes Lily would suggest something odd to see if he'd react, but after naming his own familiar, Phi, she guessed nothing was too weird for him.

To the nay-sayers who thought she was crazy to think of marrying Sev, well, she had plenty to say. This was in no way sudden, as people who really did not know anything about them or even whose business it was, claimed. Lily had known Sev for close to ten years, he was her best friend, and any other details about what went on between them was private. She did not have to defend her decision to a bunch of toerags who thought she took an interest in Sev for money.

At points, Lily wanted to tell Mary she was pregnant, but Lily was uneasy over that because Mary could not have children due to Remus Lupin and his buddies.

The only person Lily told that she was pregnant was Prof. McGonagall because she also needed permission to leave school to floo to St. Mungo's for a couple healer visits between now and the end of June. After reassuring her head of house that she fully intended on marrying Severus shortly after graduating, Lily retained her head girl position. Prof. McGonagall would not understand if Lily explained how this was all the headmaster's fault. Her own mother did not believe that one.

Minerva found herself defending Miss Evans to the headmaster. She was not entirely in accord with her student, who may be rushing things to get married and have a family, which many students and recent graduates were doing in these uncertain times. She, herself, had lived for the moment decades ago and would do it the same way, if she had another chance to do it over.

However, there were undeniable facts. Lily Evans and Severus Snape were friends for longer than they had been students at Hogwarts. This was more than a mere Head Boy and Head Girl romance that happened every couple of years. Even when they were sorted into separate houses in first year, they remained close. They had dragonpox together and they were attacked by a werewolf together. When Mr. Snape's parents died, he could rely on Miss Evans, and when Miss Evans' father died, Mr. Snape was there. Minerva was not much into the opposites attract theory, but there was something that happened to Mr. Snape when he was with Miss Evans, and no one could claim to know him better than her.

What it all boiled down to was Albus Dumbledore could be a complete tit. This was not some wager over a chess game between two strangers. There was no love potion or other charm either way since Miss Evans could be the predator with Mr. Snape having inherited such a fortune.

Minerva knew Albus had his secrets. There had been something about Severus Snape over the years, and it might have just been some perverse whim of Horace's to promote the ones he favored or the ones that gave him lavish gifts over those that were gifted. Unless he had something of value to say, Minerva was not playing along with Albus' theories that had no basis in fact.

Perhaps he should go back to thinking about Voldemort, and apply some fresh ideas to that problem, rather than deciding to wait till students are engaged with a baby on the way to want to play matchmaker or matchbreaker.

Remus overheard about the engagement, but decided not to write anything to James. Prongs was able to get himself into enough trouble, without involving women.

Lily's temper was growing shorter. She suspected it was hormones, which only the muggle literature mentioned. The wealth of wizarding information alluded to mood swings, but their explanation was not as scientific.

She could admit she was used to the way Severus looked. His hair was clean now, and she knew he washed it every day so the current accusations of him being greasy were inaccurate. Also the claims that Sev was still green. He had not been greenish for about a year. There may be a bit more green to his complexion, and Lily still did not know why his left hand was greyer than the rest of him.

The comments about the remaining pockmarks were true, but it was something that was beyond Sev's control, like his nose or the color of his eyes. Lily knew he followed the healer's directions. She did too, and was left with a few stubborn spots that were only in places Sev saw.

Lily could study him undressed every evening, and the only thing she thought that could be seriously improved was his weight to round off all those bits that were poking out like his hips, wrists, shoulder blades, spine and ribs. Mum could handle that if they lived with her a bit before Lily found someplace decent to rent. Mum already proved she was up to the challenge of feeding Mr. Picky over Easter break.

Severus did join Lily in Prof. McGonagall's office to floo with her to St. Mungo's for an examination. She had asked him to accompany her, but doubted they would find out anything new. Lily had been casting so many spells at herself, the only thing he didn't know was the gender. There was a spell for that too, but Lily said she'd prefer to be surprised.

He suspected at some point she'd get around to casting it, just so she'd know what colors to concentrate on. Once NEWTs, graduation, and the wedding were over, that would be next on Lily's list of things to consume all her time, after she chose someplace for them to live.

Lily figured it was best to use a healer recommended by St. Mungo's since that's where she'd be having the baby. She already had her first appointment to meet her and have an initial exam during Easter break, now it was five weeks later.

From the outside, there was nothing to see. Her stomach was still the same. It had not been flat since before she was attacked by Lupin, but that wasn't her fault and Sev said he did not mind that she put on weight from her impulse to gorge herself. He only drew the line on snacking in bed, while he was there. Lily already knew to clean up any crumbs that got into the sheets before Sev came in.

This appointment was not as her mother described it either. There was no paper gown, scooting her bottom to the end of the table, and putting her feet up in metal supports. Did mum call them stirrups, like saddles for horses? Maybe it was Lily's imagination thinking of what else could be done in that position if it was just Sev and her.

It was a series of spells while she was fully dressed, and a lot of them were spells Lily already cast. Maybe she could take up healing with just a little training, once the baby was older. She wasn't going to wait twelve years for when it started at Hogwarts. Maybe once Sev was done with his apprenticeship, he could take care of it. He could still do his potions stuff, as long as their house didn't turn into something like Moonshine's with clogged sinks and mustaches drawn on the mirrors. Maybe it was a lucky thing that Mr. Filch taught Sev so much.

Severus was treated like he was in the way. He was not getting between the healer and Lily, stood on the side and stayed quiet. What did this healer want from him, for him to wait downstairs near the floo like a good boy?

When they returned to Hogwarts after a shopping trip in Diagon Alley for Lily, Severus noticed things had been moved in his room. Usually the house elves were careful to leave everything as they found it.

Severus knew it was not Lily. She was interested in what he was doing with Mary Wilkes, but that was because this Damocles fellow thought that with Severus' limited experience with werewolves, they might be able to find some cure. Lily was being odd. Wanting to be involved, but not hands on, or suggesting possible potion combinations. For her, he left the werewolf notes out, so Lily would not have to go through every drawer to find what she was looking for.

He checked his cauldrons and his stored ingredients and implements. Someone had looked through his knives, and his mortars were shifted about.

Trying to look at the set-up objectively, Severus tried to pick out anything that indicated he was looking to formulate a substitute for phoenix tears, rather than some miracle for werewolves. The ingredients were all wrong for any sort of lycanthropy remedy. Would whoever snooped know that? Would he or she believe Severus was an idiot? That would suit Severus just fine. He preferred people underestimated him.

Before he overreacted, Severus thought he might as well ask Lily if she knew of anything.

"Is everything alright in here?" he started. "Some things were moved in my room."

"It's fine, Sev. Anything missing?"

"I don't think so. Other than Prof. McGonagall, did you tell anyone else we would be out all afternoon?"

"I haven't told Mary about the baby, Sev, so I didn't bother to tell her we'd be in London. Too many questions."

Lily was annoyed. Not truly at Sev, since if he said someone was in here, it was almost definitely true. He was not overreacting yet, but she did recall the long dry spell of no sex when he thought they were being followed and watched. Sev had been correct, thanks to what a monumental pain Dumbledore turned out to be.

Why would someone look through their rooms? Sev did not leave piles of money about or his secret Slytherin plans. Actually, Sev lived rather simple for someone who was supposed to be wealthy. There was no racing broom, clothes, or toys. Most of the books around here were from the Hogwarts library, and Sev still used those old textbooks of his mum's. Less than two months left at Hogwarts and they had another god damned toerag bothering them.

Seeing Lily get angry without responding, Severus suggested, "Perhaps you could mention it to Prof. McGonagall? I can cast some detection charms to see if anything was left." He did not want Lily angry at him. Severus would cast stronger wards on their rooms, booby traps, and whatever else came to mind that wouldn't accidentally catch a house elf.

They had one last meeting with their Wigtown Wanderers club, and said they may see each other again once the new season started. Lily would be seven months pregnant then, but did not want word getting out prematurely. There was also a chance England could be playing for the World Cup so they talked about that too. Lily already knew from Sev's smirk he had noticed James 'Quidditch' Potter had not made the team in any position.

Their Defense group started meeting twice a week now as OWLs and NEWTs got closer. Sometimes, they'd branch into other subjects for a quick yet thorough review.

Lily was not sure if Severus had chased away all the Gryffindors that needed help with arithmancy, or they actually learned enough of the basics to continue on their own. They would be on their own next year without Severus calling them names once a week.

She knew she needed to concentrate on reviewing for her NEWTs, rather than worrying and studying everyone that came into their rooms. It was unlikely it was someone from their Defense group, or a Gryffindor who had a shaky grip on arithmancy. Dumbledore had come to mind, but what would he be looking for? More artifacts from the Hogwarts' founders that Severus was using as doorstops or paperweights? He was the tit that destroyed Hufflepuff's cup, if he was telling the truth, which Lily highly doubted.

* * *

At last, Horace got a hold of a wand. It was only right it was Rowle that was going to suffer, he thought to himself as he got far enough away to apparate. He couldn't stand Rowle. As soon as Albus got this ruddy tattoo off his arm and buy a new wand at Ollivander's, Horace was going to snap this one in two. He'd send the pieces back to Rowle, but no owl deserved that.

Nervously, he waited at the locked gates. Why did Albus change the locking charm? Didn't he think that Horace would head straight here as soon as he could? Voldemort would think the same. He did not have time to wait around exposed for a pack of blood-thirsty Death Eaters to find him here.

He transfigured himself into an unbelievably large rubber ball. The gate would not let him over, so he moved along the wall a bit, bounced himself against it, then bounced higher to fly over the top. His trajectory was halted and Horace dropped back outside the wall. Damn.

It appeared he would have to wait outside the gate until someone opened it so he could enter. Horace had to really use his transfiguration muscles to find a less obvious form that did not involve much compression of his mass. He was not so good at self-transfiguration that he could turn himself into something as insignificant as a feather or a dust mote.

The wait was long, and Horace impatiently thought repeatedly of how shortsighted it was of Albus not to have planned in advance for him to escape. Finally, Hagrid and Kettleburn were on their way out, probably to get a drink down at the Hog's Head.

He exhausted himself with the burst of movement to get himself as a stone boar statue into the gate before it shut.

Horace transfigured back into himself to catch his breath since it was not possible as a statue to do that, or even necessary. He walked slowly to the castle since he wasn't getting any younger, in addition to the reduced rations he was on for months.

He saw Albus walking towards him.

"Horace, what are you doing here?"

"And hello to you too, Albus. You don't know the time I've had. Let's go in and get some tea in me. I've had nothing but swill to drink for months."

"I'm afraid I cannot let you enter the school. You should not even be on the grounds, Horace."

"What are you talking about? How else am I supposed to get to you?"

"Are you now a Death Eater?"

"Certainly not. Once you get rid of this ruddy tattoo, I'll be right as rain."

Albus' eyebrows rose as he inquired, "You obtained a tattoo?"

"Not by choice. Why would I want a bloody stupid skull with a snake writhing out of its mouth? It's how the Dark Lord summons his Death Eaters."

"He does?"

Horace pulled up his left sleeve, declaring, "It's hideous. None of the ladies I prefer would care for something like this."

"May I?"

"Hell yeah. I expected you might have to touch it to get it off."

"I'm not sure if I can," Albus muttered as he studied the writhing tattoo. "All Death Eaters have one?"

"Yes, not all his followers, just the Death Eaters."

"So you are a Death Eater?"

"Not by choice, Albus. It was sort of along the lines of you're with us or you die."

"Ah."

"Well?"

"Difficult to say on a brief examination, Horace. I'm going to have to do some research. Do all the Death Eaters have it on their left arms?"

"I suppose. We don't go whipping them out to show each other."

"Is it always visible?"

"No, sometimes mine fades to nothing. It's painful when he actually calls everyone too."

"Hmm."

"So what about some tea, old boy?"

"Tea? Uh, I can whip up something, but let's uh … oh, how about the Shrieking Shack?"

"What?"

"I can't let you in the school itself, and that's close. There's a cave ..."

"Cave? What do I look like? My piano's a finely tuned instrument. It cannot go in a cave."

"Your possessions are safe, Horace, but you will not be able to make yourself comfortable in the Shack or cave. It's only temporary while I do my research."

"What about my position?"

"I filled it already."

"Temporarily. I was coming back."

"I'm not sure if the Board ..."

"Snape made the whole ruddy thing up! He's ruined my life! I would have been safe here, instead of this whole mess. Why didn't you listen to me?"

"Horace, I think you've gotten a bit addled in all this. I did break into his property. I'm not entirely sure what happened in your office the following morning, but I cannot imagine any scenario in which you would have been entirely innocent."

"He's bamboozled you."

"Oh no, Horace. Severus makes no secret of how much he dislikes me. In fact, I don't recall him pleading or even explaining his case to me at all."

"Snape must have resorted to bribery."

"What do you mean?"

"Inheriting the Lestrange fortune must have gone to his empty head. Taking years of imagined slights and turning them into some twisted, personal revenge of his. He's lording it over everyone now."

Albus thought Severus remained mostly the same. He was at least consistent in his affection of Miss Evans. If Severus was letting money rule his senses, she would not tolerate that. Severus needed her, more than she needed him.

"I think you are letting your ordeal cloud your judgment, Horace. Forget about Mr. Snape. Let's go over to the Shrieking Shack and I'll order us up some tea."

"Forget about him? He's the cause of this whole affair."

"Hardly, Horace."

* * *

"How about Horatio or Hortense?"

Afraid his disagreement would settle these as Lily's final decision, Severus replied, "If you like them."

Lily rolled her eyes at his standard response. There were very few people that could carry either of those names with dignity through their lives.

"Do you even care, Sev?"

"Yes, and I know you are investing a lot of thought into this project."

"Why don't you have anything to say about the names than?"

"Won't you eventually have a short list of ones you prefer? There's still months to go, and I want to remain open-minded to your suggestions, Lily."

Why was Severus saying the right things to her? She knew this was not the way he really felt.

"You can come out and tell me what you're really thinking, Sev."

"About what?"

"Me, the baby, getting married."

Severus cocked an eyebrow at her, "What do you mean, Lily? Do you need assistance with something?"

"Assistance?"

"With anything. I know you like making the decisions and handling everything, but I can help."

"No, I mean that you've had it with me."

"Is this about your NEWTs?"

"NEWTs?" Lily exclaimed.

"Yes, they start in less than a week. We've been reviewing together so there's no need to get all worked up."

"I'm not worked up."

"Than what has you worked up, other than deluding yourself that Horatio and Hortense are nice names?"

"What's wrong with them?"

"Shortening either one of them."

"I wouldn't do that to my child."

It was Severus' turn to roll his eyes. Lily was not the one he was worried about referring to their child by the nickname of whore.

Bringing Severus back to the original question, or actually the related one, Lily pressed, "You don't want it or me, do you?"

"What gave you that idea?"

"You're always doing things without me."

"Other than arithmancy and runes, not really."

"Not here."

"We've been at Hogwarts since Easter, and the only time we left, we went together to St. Mungo's."

"No. Why won't you answer me honestly, Sev?"

"About what? I'm not understanding what you are asking."

"What do you want to do?"

Severus waited a moment for a follow-up remark, but Lily chose to stop speaking and wait for him to answer. He did not have an answer to whatever crisis Lily was trying to induce.

"What I want? To concentrate on specific things in a logical order, perhaps? I'm aware of the wedding and our baby. NEWTs will happen first, then graduation, which we might have to do something special because we're head boy and head girl? Then we're getting married. Then … oh, I guess we'll move somewhere. We might have a bit to do with that, and working out my schedule with Damocles. Then the baby, which isn't due until November, but could be sooner, and we will have time between moving to where you want and then. That should give months to get things ready, including possible names."

"Why should NEWTs matter to me? I'm not going anywhere. I'm going to be trapped at home with a squalling infant."

Severus sighed. Lily was complaining about something that was months away, and that may not be as bad as she imagined it. Shortly after the baby was born would be their first Christmas together as a family. She loved Christmas and would have plenty to keep her busy. He had not proposed renting her a prison, but somewhere to live.

"Lily, I understand your concerns. What would you like me to do to help you?"

She frowned. Why wasn't Severus arguing with her?

"What can you do about it?"

"Maybe nothing. Perhaps this is why the headmaster tampered with the contraception spell. The anxiety of this unexpected turn of events is supposed to drive us apart."

"Why would it do that?"

"He doesn't know us. We stay together even when things are unpleasant."

Lily nodded, then had to ask, "Is marrying me unpleasant?"

"You still haven't told me what you have planned. Is it that bad?"

She laughed, "No. I'm leaning towards something simple. I've been spending my time reviewing, and by now, I don't care if anyone shows up."

Severus knew that did not sound right. Lily wanted something big. Huger than Petunia's. Maybe she had nothing planned since she did not intend on marrying him. This exercise had been a possible excuse for the argument to break it off.

* * *

By the time their week of NEWT taking arrived, Lily was back to feeling well-prepared and relaxed. Sev had started a new review method of rewarding her with physical pleasures when she was able to give a very thorough answer to his study questions.

After her Charms NEWT, Severus reviewed all the questions with her and then spent hours pleasing her into a puddle before he tortured her with Defense review for the next day. Lily considered that if she was no longer able to walk down the stairs to the Great Hall to take the NEWT, it was still worth it.

Besides having all the answers for her NEWTs during the tests, having her head emptied regularly as waves of delirious ecstasy overcame her at Sev's hands, Lily caught Sev sleeping with his fingers spread over her abdomen more than once.

Lily gave that some thought. It was not an act on Sev's part, if he was sleeping. She was pretty sure he was from the snoring and drooling. Actually, she had never known Sev to fake being asleep on her, however, it seemed absurd to think he was faking sleeping while waiting for her to wake up. There was also her habit of waking him up, if she wanted anything so there was no point in pretending.

Sev had always been strange. Well strange, but he was being himself, if Lily wanted to admit to him being different. At first, he was odd, but then she liked his talk about witches and wizards and a magical school, she was special, and he was special too. Lily doubted what he said because Petunia said so. There were witches and wizards on television, but not in real life, but it was fun that Severus thought Lily was like him, but not like him.

As Lily lay in bed reminiscing, she had thought Sev was mental yet harmless unless he suggested bad stuff to her. At first, she found him a little annoying but was amazed by his incredible imagination. Her mother had mentioned that Severus might have made it all up because he was lonely. Lily wanted to believe him, but always had doubts until Prof. McGonagall rang their front bell.

Till then, Lily understood what her mother had said about Severus being lonely. It took a while for Sev to even admit there was more to his parents, other than his mum was a witch. Petunia had already identified him and his address, the first time he had popped out of that bush.

A thought occurred to Lily. Was Severus still lonely, even though she was with him most of the day? She took an interest in his arithmancy project regarding werewolves for Mary's sake.

Lily figured she might as well ask, and did when she followed Severus the next morning into the lavatory, "Sev, are you feeling lonely?"

"What?" he exclaimed.

"Lonely? I'm not spending enough time with you."

"You followed me in here to watch me take a piss. I would consider that spending too much time with me, Lily."

"I came in here to talk to you, not watch you."

Severus sighed, washed his hands, then turned to shrug at Lily. "I'm fine. If you want to do something special, just let me know."

"I didn't mean that."

"What do you mean than?"

"Like when you were younger."

"Oh. No, this much better than being in Slytherin. I definitely prefer being with you."

"That's nice, but I meant when you were little, when you started following me around."

Severus raised his eyebrows questioningly. He had no idea what Lily wanted now.

"Oh, come on, Sev. Before me, did you play with other children?"

"Not really. Why do you ask?"

"I'm worried about you."

"What's this about, Lily? What does it matter if I talked to other children when I was young? I watched them. Is that what you want to know?"

"Watched them do what?"

"Play with rocks and dirt and whatever else they did. They were children."

"Didn't you want to do that?"

"No," Severus replied while giving Lily a look like she was crazy. "Getting hit with rocks hurt."

"What?"

"Rocks, stones, and bits of pavement hurt."

"What do you mean?"

"Never mind. I didn't want to play with them."

Lily frowned at him.

"What?" he asked. "Why is it important if I liked playing with other children in Spinner's End? What is it you're after, Lily?"

"Nothing. I … I don't know. I'm not sure if you're happy or not."

"We have one more NEWT for Transfiguration today and then we're done, except for graduation. Then I'll be happy we're no longer students here. Alright?"

Lily laughed, "NEWTs. You make it sound so simple to have us focus on one thing at a time."

"It is. We're aware of everything else, but there's no need to panic if we deal with each thing individually. But what was all this about me and other children?"

"Nothing. I was thinking about you last night and all your stories about Hogwarts."

"Still having trouble sleeping?"

"I'm not tired like I was at first. It's like I'm really energetic and don't need as much sleep, but I don't feel like getting out of bed."

"Alright. If you do feel tired, just let me know. I don't mind if you want to lie down or take a nap."

Lily rolled her eyes. She was a bit old to be taking a nap.

* * *

Lily had not realized that magical parents could come to graduation. That was so unfair. She'd like her mum to be here, not just for her, but Sev as well. He didn't have anyone, and if his mum was still alive, Lily doubted she would have shown up, even with Sev as head boy. It wasn't nice to think ill of the dead, but Lily couldn't help it. Sev would not be so messed up if he had normal parents who took care of him.

The hisses of mudblood were disconcerting as she walked to the podium. She heard them, and from the look of Prof. McGonagall's narrowed eyes, anyone who was caught was going to pay. Lily took her position to read her speech, looked back towards Sev, and broke out in a smile as she caught sight of him hiding his wand.

Perhaps her speech was all wrong, now that she heard that, but Lily did not care what they thought. Her idea was to speak about how special magic was, how wonderful it was, and how it could benefit everyone. She had read it multiple times to Severus. He never told her it was bad, however all he said about his speech was that he knew he followed Lily, so he could get away with saying, 'I agree with Lily.' He could be such a git sometimes.

She was disappointed by the polite applause she received. Lily had put a lot of work into this speech, and it was the truth. Magic was wonderful, and things did not have to be so complex and tumultuous.

Lily suspected that Severus had changed his speech overnight. Yesterday, Prof. Dumbledore spoke to them about some secret group he had to defeat He Who Must Not Be Named and invited them to join it after graduation. Well, with Dumbledore in charge of it, there was no way Lily wanted anything to do with it. They were at last going to be free from him. She had enough of the toerag to last her a lifetime. And what did he know about He Who Must Not Be Named? Dumbledore fought a duel with Grindelwald decades ago. He Who Must Not Be Named was a powerful and evil wizard, but when it came to accepting challenges, he was evil in a nasty and underhanded way. He did not fight the wizard that challenged him, but worked on killing off everyone they loved.

When they returned to their rooms, Severus had plenty to say, using a lot of foul language. Today, he was back to using all those big words of his. It was short, but Lily understood what he was saying. There was more than black and white, and nothing is simple or what it appears to be. People cannot be labeled as simply good or bad, especially when there were opportunities in times of uncertainty. Some things only occurred due to someone's arrogant attitude 'because I can'. Right and wrong had nothing to do with it, there is only power and those that abuse it.

Lily clapped immediately when Sev finished. She didn't care that there was a silent pause. It had been her previous opinion that Prof. Upsilon, who taught Ancient Runes, was an eccentric kook, especially with his insistence on only speaking Greek at England's school of magic, but his standing to express his approval, got a couple teachers to follow suit. More people stood in a lemming like fashion, till more were standing than sitting. Although annoyed that she had not received the same recognition, Lily stood too.

Rita Skeeter foresaw another update for _Witch Weekly_ on her homely prince. Severus Snape could be considered one of the movers and shakers of the wizarding world since he inherited the Lestrange vault, if he chose to be. Knowing of Dumbledore's audacity at stealing Hufflepuff's cup, followed by breaking into the main Lestrange, now Snape, house, she knew exactly who his intended audience was.


	58. Chapter 58 Is this it?

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor any of the characters from the books or movies. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

AN: Poll closed for next story. More teen snape. Results are viewable through my author : Apologies in advance for perpetuating stereotypes about countries that have no basis in fact.

AU LE/SS

**Snape's Worst Memory**

**Chapter 58 Is This It?**

Lily was annoyed that Mary always made everything about her. Severus had not said anything about werewolves, but Mary took his graduation speech to mean that she was not a bad person, and others should look beyond the werewolf thing to get to know her.

In order to distract Mary from bothering Severus, Lily whispered her secret as to why she needed to marry Severus quickly.

Mary's response hurt. "I thought you were getting a bit thick around the middle."

At the graduation feast, a few other people talked to Severus to thank him. What a bunch of toerags. Sev meant Dumbledore, not whatever family or group they were affiliated with. At least no one had the nerve to claim he meant that Death Eaters were misunderstood, since the only two Gryffindors graduating were herself and Mary. The fact that there were not seven Gryffindors was all Dumbledore's fault. He's the one that kept encouraging Potter and Black to bully other students. Those are the kind of people that would be great in his secret group to defeat He Who Must Not Be Named.

Severus could tell Lily was in a bad mood. The graduation feast was one of the few times he was allowed to publicly dine with Lily at Hogwarts. Every person that attempted to talk to him without greeting her got the icy green stare. It was his fault for not parroting her idealistic ideas. Why lie? He hated most of these people, he hated this school, and really did not care what they thought of him because very few people ever formed a favorable opinion of him. There was nothing he could do about it now, other than sliding platters of meat and tureens of gravy towards Lily and the Wilkes, and continue looking at the insincere bastards that approached him with an air of indifferent boredom.

His things were already packed up earlier in the day. All he needed to do was change his clothes when they returned to their rooms and summon Phi.

Lily merely asked Severus if he had all his things, rather than recounting their day. He had been with her so there was nothing to discuss. She did appreciate the way he treated the toerags when they tried to talk to him afterwards. It was like that article in _The Quibbler_. Severus did not care who agreed with him or what they had to discuss. His mind was made up.

They walked side by side out of the school, down to the gates, and apparated to her back garden. Lily and Severus were done with Hogwarts.

She already knew in advance of her mother's suggestion that Severus continue living at Spinner's End till they were married. Severus had only responded to her reading her mother's suggestion aloud to him from her letter with a shrug.

Lily would rather wait another week to get things properly set up for their wedding. Neither her mother or Severus objected when she asked them earlier in the month. It was so difficult to plan things from school. Her mother had agreed that a simple license with a small party at the house would be best and discreet, considering Lily was already past four months pregnant.

Severus had arranged with potions master Damocles to visit frequently after graduation, but not to start actual work until after the wedding. He had not told Lily that he actually asked for another week since Severus hoped that Lily would be in the mood to go somewhere for a honeymoon of sorts.

He did not mind the extra expense of getting a portkey at the last moment, but would be upset if Lily agreed to somewhere then changed her mind and it went to waste without a good reason. Paris seemed likeliest since that is where the Wilkes went. Petunia and Vernon went to Majorca. Severus knew where that was, but he did not know what about the island appealed to visitors. Lily liked beaches, and if it was an island, it should have them.

Severus patiently got his instructions each day regarding the wedding. He understood this was not the wedding Lily wanted, and she was expressing her frustration at anyone within range. He mused that the Gryffindor that caused this situation with his senseless meddling, Albus Dumbledore, was not here nor would ever face the consequences. When the old man had solicited them to join his secret organization, he used the phrase 'greater good'. What was good about ruining Lily's wedding?

Some of the details changed from day to day so Severus aggravated Lily by not acting immediately on any direction that did not need to be performed immediately. Her first idea was Severus was to rent a tuxedo, first classic black, then grey with tails because their party would be during the day, then she was not happy with wedding gowns that she could get on short notice so his attire was downgraded to a dark muggle suit that would not outshine Lily's loose-fitting floral print dress. He had not seen it, but Lily described it to him. There was also a change regarding the flowers, but Severus had mercifully not been entrusted with that task. Lily restricted Severus to getting himself dressed and bringing his finger to a jeweler's to get the wedding band she chose fitted.

Mrs. Evans approved his clothing the day prior to the civil ceremony and party so he was as up to date as he could be unless Lily changed her mind again the day they were supposed to marry.

Severus spent a night wondering if Lily was going to go through with it the next day. Her mother gave no indication that she would not, and Vernon and Petunia had phoned when they were leaving their house earlier in the day. They would not be pleased to drive here for no reason. Or perhaps not. Petunia might enjoy Lily changing her mind and embarrassing him in some public fashion to say she would never marry him. If that was her plan, Lily should have invited more people.

There was a chance Malcolm and Mary Wilkes might actually feel sorry for him. Severus did give them house elves, sold them a spacious house and was going to work on some sort of cure for werewolves. That had to be worth some consideration. It would probably manifest itself as pity.

Severus showed up where he was supposed to and waited. Was this it? Is this how it was going to play out? Him waiting at a government office for hours while Lily sat at home, stubbornly refusing to come because she had changed her mind? He sat down. There was no need to draw attention to himself by pacing about because he was alone.

The large plain faced clock mocked him enough. With apparation, Severus did not need to leave his house early, and had arrived with two minutes to spare. Lily was not here, and her family was supposed to arrive with her so he was alone.

One o'clock, the designated time struck as he watched the red second hand sweep around the dial to verify it was exactly one. It did not hesitate as it passed the large twelve at the top and kept going. The long minute hand snapped to point at the twelve, confirming that a moment ago it had been 12:59.

When the red second hand had traveled ten more times around the clock, Severus began to wonder what was the amount of time he was supposed to wait before leaving. The sign said this office was open till four o'clock, but the fellow that was supposed to perform the ceremony once they had a license that made it legal was supposed to meet them at the Evans at two.

The telephone in the office rang multiple times, but no one ever called his name to inquire if he was present and waiting for someone.

At 1:25, Severus considered he should perhaps wait till two. At that point, he would have a sound argument that they could not possibly be at two places at once. There was no sensible need for him to have a sound defense since there should be no disagreement over Lily being late, but with her logic meant little.

He ignored how his face was tingling behind his eyes and nose and focused on the clock's second hand. In thirty-three minutes, he would leave. This was not an unexpected outcome. He should have planned in advance for this.

A large mass moved to his side, and Severus looked up.

Vernon Dursley muttered, "They're coming." He looked around with a sigh, and added the comment, "You seem relaxed."

Relaxed? Severus supposed he was. Either Lily was marrying him or not today. Years of maybe had wrung all the emotion out of this for him. He knew not to hope that it was going to happen, or else he would have started crying twenty minutes ago when she did not show up.

Perhaps Petunia had sent her husband round as a joke and to get a first-hand eyewitness account of how his hope renewed itself at 1:27 and slowly fizzled away as the second hand swept around the clock six more times before the double glass doors opened with Lily, her mother and sister.

Mrs. Evans spoke first, exclaiming, "At last. Let's get this over with and hurry back."

When Severus did not get up right away, she studied him. "You look a bit peaky, Severus. Are you alright?"

"Yes," he replied, standing.

He joined Mrs. Evans at the counter and watched quietly while bureaucracy took over. The application had been submitted already. Today he was supposed to pay the fee.

The outcome after close to ten more minutes in this office that was conducting little business, as Severus had observed in the past half hour, was that they needed to sign more papers, then the license was rendered and he paid the amount that had already been agreed upon.

As soon as the document was handed over, Lily urged, "Come on, we have to hurry."

Severus followed along, still thinking about one of ideas from earlier in the week about why the license needed to be picked up today, rather than earlier. It was not an official license until they had the ceremony so it made little difference if it was acquired minutes or days in advance.

When they got to the car, Severus stood dumbly next to it while Lily argued with Petunia.

Mrs. Evans may have heard this earlier in the day because she shortly told them, "Let Severus sit in the front. He does not look well, and his legs are longest."

Another heated discussion began, and Mrs. Evans almost yelled, "Shut up. I will sit in the middle."

Vernon noticed Severus standing still and pointed to the passenger door. Women. It was a relief that Petunia only had one sister. He couldn't imagine his sister, Marge, going all to pieces like this. She would be dressed, ready and waiting at whatever time she stated. Unlike the Evans, she was punctual. In fact, Marge would even have her bulldogs lined up and waiting faster than his Petunia's spoiled little sister, Lily, could pick out a pair of shoes.

He had to agree with his lovely Petunia that it was doubtful Severus was even the father of the brat's bastard. There was some mention of him coming into a large amount of money, and he had his wife's word along with his own observations that her sister was simply the wrong sort. Got some very strange ideas at that fancy boarding school. Of course, he had to accept the bit about magic, having seen it firsthand, but if it was one thing Vernon knew it was people. He may have been seven sheets to the wind at his bachelor party, but he could see that Severus was uncomfortable around women. Prior to today, he judged Severus shy, probably homosexual, but competent at his strengths such as book-learning, definitely not athletics. Today, he simply looked shell-shocked. Petunia's declaration that her little sister bullied him did not seem to be far from the truth.

Severus had ridden in a car before, but maybe he was not feeling well today. The ladies were bickering behind him about nothing. They were talking about nothing, but they would not be quiet.

They were only a short distance from the house. Short enough that they could have realized it was past one and phoned prior to driving over to meet him.

There were people already in the back yard and on the porch waiting for them. Severus was not even sure who these people were. He knew Petunia and Vernon, and Malcolm and Mary. It was a sea of strange faces.

"Stop walking around like a zombie, Sev," Lily berated him.

Mrs. Evans asked, "Would you like some water, Severus?"

"No thank you, Mrs. Evans."

Wilkes got in front of him and was wearing a big smirk. There were muggles crawling all over this place. Mary and him were finding them quite amusing.

With everything behind schedule now, the bride, groom, and their wedding party, including Petunia as the matron of honor and Wilkes as his best man, were sorted into position. Rings were verified as being in the right pockets, and things got underway.

Severus recognized this official. They had a sort of practice earlier in the week at his office. There was no study needed since Severus only needed to repeat what the man said when addressed. Lily was doing the same thing when he spoke to her.

It seemed to take a lot less time than their practice. He did not mess up putting the ring on Lily's finger. Severus remembered which one since it was the same one her engagement ring was on. He could not miss that.

Lily waited a long moment for Severus to move when they were told, "You may now kiss the bride," before she stood on her toes and gave him a quick kiss.

He was really married to Lily? Severus felt light-headed.

Malcolm had turned a bit to look at what the other muggles were doing when Snape's knees gave out. He got a hand out to catch his elbow, but his legs still folded. His fall now tilted towards Wilkes rather than straight down.

The big muggle married to Evans' sister stepped forward and got a hold of the back of Snape to help lower him to the ground gently.

Her mouth open, Lily did not get the word, "No," out until a couple people suggested Severus fainted. Sev didn't faint. He did things like telling off a wizard like Albus Dumbledore and blasting a werewolf's head apart.

Severus opened his eyes in confusion. What was he doing lying on the Evans' sofa? Besides Lily, only the Wilkes could have cast something at him, unless someone had been hiding among all those muggles.

"Take it easy, Snape. I agree it's a might too hot and sunny out there."

"Wilkes?"

"You fainted."

Severus frowned. He did not faint.

"Hey, take it slow. If I could have gotten away with it, I would have tried that too."

"What?"

"Did you want me to hold the glass of water for you?"

"No."

"Mary will fill me in later. I was getting in trouble with not quite fitting in so I volunteered to keep you company."

"Where's Lily?"

"She was in here a minute or two ago, but then had to go back out."

Severus did not feel well as he sat up.

Wilkes held out a glass and said, "Here you go."

It was only water with ice.

Malcolm took a moment to walk to the kitchen door and held it open to see what was happening out there now.

"I think they're playing some game. They've lined up in rows. Oh, make up your mind if you're up. Your mother in law is coming," he announced as he let the door swing shut and hustled back over to the chair he had been seated in.

Wilkes was right. Mrs. Evans bustled through the door and seeing Severus sitting, chided, "Did you eat anything today, Severus?"

"A bit," he lied. Why should he bother when he knew there would be an immense amount of food here?

Even though Severus said he did eat, Mrs. Evans shook her head. He had not been looking well.

"There's some chairs in the shade, unless you'd prefer to sit on the porch."

"Should I even go back out?" he asked. He was afraid he'd be made fun of for collapsing at his wedding.

Wilkes glared at Snape. He knew Evans called the shots between the two of them, but she had to at least expect him to be at the party following their wedding. Even for a half-blood Slytherin, he was a pretty poor example of their house unless this was all some clever ruse, which was highly doubtful.

"If you're feeling up to it. Did you need to rest more inside?"

"Nah, he's fine now," Malcolm responded with a smile. "It's not every day one of your beautiful daughters gets married, Mrs. Evans."

Despite Wilkes' reassurance that Severus was fine, Mrs. Evans hovered and closely followed the two of them onto the back porch. Severus saw that there was some organized activity occurring so he chose a chair away from it and in the shade.

Besides giving him another glass of water, Mrs. Evans ran her fingers through his hair to straighten his middle part out. When was Lily going to convince Severus that this long uncut style was simply a mess? Now that he graduated from school, he should start trying to look respectable.

Severus remembered Mrs. Evans, Lily, Petunia, Vernon and both the Wilkes talking to him at various points for the rest of the afternoon and bringing him different plates of food that he was not particularly interested in. He only had to stand and join Lily for that ceremony with the cake that he observed at Petunia's wedding.

It was not hard. Lily told him to put his hands over hers while she cut the first piece, and then he was supposed to feed her a bite of it. Severus accomplished that, and got moved to another seat at the same table as Lily, next to her.

He tasted his slice of cake. The sweetness made it taste foul, and the white icing was gritty with the amount of sugar it contained.

As far as weddings went, Severus was glad he only had to do this once.

***********

Lily had already made a decision regarding their summer travel, based on a conversation she had with Mary during the party. The World Cup was being held in Texas this summer, and she wanted to attend that with Malcolm and Mary.

Normally, spectators were put through the inconvenience of camping around the large quidditch stadium for close to a week to stagger arrivals, but Malcolm knew someone and for the right amount, they could go over with one of the last portkeys because of the full moon. She was sure Lily could use a similar excuse since she'd be even more pregnant then.

Quidditch world cup? Severus was aware of the event, but did not want to go to one. He certainly never thought Lily would want to either.

He repeatedly confirmed she preferred a portkey to Texas to watch quidditch over Paris or Majorca, or anyplace else with a beach, so he contacted Wilkes and the four of them were scheduled to take the last portkey from London to Sweetwater, Texas with confirmed seating for the World Cup match.

Severus was not sure they were really going, but if the opportunity for the reservation slipped by with him doing nothing, Lily was sure to make a big deal of it. This pregnancy was making her more unreasonable than ever.

Lily, on the other hand, was concerned. Sev claimed he was not ill, but he had never fainted before. His attitude was almost Gryffindor with his ability to ignore his health and suggest they go somewhere for a week. She was heartened that he had suggested Paris because Lily was starting to think that the fire had already died out before they were married. Severus had been very careful in the bedroom lately, even though from everything Lily had been told or read that it was fine for them to do whatever they did before.

Even with Severus going to work for that potions master every day, he could at least eat two meals cooked by her mum while they lived here. She even packed him food for lunch. Lily was impatient to move out of her mother's home, but found it comfortable to remain. If Sev was going to be at work most of the day, it gave her some company and Lily had not spent much time in her mother's company for years, except when she was grounded during the summer and preferred to remain in her bedroom sulking.

She visited Mary, but with Malcolm not wanting to work, he was also there. Lily did not like their house much. It was big, but it did not feel like a home. Mary was working on it, but carpets and curtains of any color, were not enough to scrape away generations of dark wizards scheming and who knows what else within the walls.

At least it was satisfying to know that Severus was not comfortable in such surroundings. How could she had even believed Sev was going to turn into some kind of dark wizard? Gryffindor might as well be the house of liars with Dumbledore as their inspiration.

Lily still read _The Daily Prophet _every day. Things were getting worse. Another reason why she did not want to move away from her mother. If James bloody Potter could end up on her porch, anyone else could. Now that Severus was family and lived here, he had strengthened the spells on the house to a paranoid level. That was in addition to him sleeping here every night, the preferred time for Death Eaters to attack. Cowards liked to surprise sleeping people. Thinking of cowards, Lily almost wished that Dumbledore decided to drop one evening by to get a taste of the wards. There were a couple clever charms she had added, but had no one to test them out on to see them in action.

For the World Cup, they met the Wilkes at the Ministry, and queued for their portkey. They had packed hardly anything since they also had one of the first portkeys back to London due to Lily's pregnancy and a hefty surcharge.

Another newly married couple was in their group. They recognized Lucius Malfoy and Narcissa Black because they were a few years ahead of them at Hogwarts. Both had been in Slytherin. The Malfoys recognized Malcolm and Severus and were distantly polite to their wives, until Malcolm reminded them that Mary and Lily were Gryffindors from the same year as him.

The four of them were pretty sure neither of the Malfoys was a werewolf, and Narcissa did not currently appear pregnant. Lily's belly was now clearly rounded, but it had taken months for that to appear. She was relieved that she finally looked pregnant, but also glad it did not take shape before she graduated school.

Their portkey departure was very prompt, and Lily did not feel so well once they arrived so the two couples moved out of the arrival area, and sat down for a short while since the game was not scheduled to start for another two hours. There was some sort of show prior to the match regarding the two teams and the culture of their countries. Lily was siding with Severus in favor of Greece, and the Wilkes preferred Brazil. However, none of them felt very strongly about either country.

Lily smirked when Malcolm returned with some refreshments. He was informed Coca-Cola was a beverage popular with the local wizards.

Mary declared it, "Too fizzy to catch on with adults."

Severus was not sure what to make of it. He knew what it was, but never bothered to drink it before. It was definitely cold since it was served in a disposable cup full of ice. It continued to fizz when he held a bit in his mouth, but there was a cloying sweetness to it that he did not like. If it came in a different flavor, he might find that more satisfactory.

They got up and followed the crowd towards the enormous stadium, bypassing the vendors since both the ladies already had omnioculars as previous gifts from their husbands.

The ushers indicated that their seats were 'up' multiple times. Mary assured Lily that 'up' was better than sitting at close to ground level or their necks would hurt before long. Both the fellows had a hand on their wives' elbows as they ascended the stairs slowly for Lily's benefit, and not at the pace of everyone else rushing to get to their seats, or back down to the bottom to purchase just one more thing.

Once they ascended to the correct level, there was a quick discussion between two contrary ushers and it seemed their seats were a long walk around this tier to another section. All of them confirmed as they walked that the numbers were going in the right direction, and they should reach their seats with time to spare before anything began.

James Potter was of the opinion that these seats sucked. If Remus didn't have his little furry problem, James would have brought him along and they would be sitting somewhere better. The section was not so bad, being more than halfway up the stadium, but they were at the very back. He was trying to tell the rest of the Braga Broomfleet team that all they had to do was wait till the ushers were busy to move down to the front to fill in the good seats that were still empty. Their captain and manager were against it once he got them to understand his plan in their stupid language. Their stupid owner should have gotten them better tickets, if he didn't expect them to try to improvise. Cheap bastard.

He was in the midst of another sighing jag, waiting for this game to get going. It was going to be so boring. Greece? Brazil? James was not interested in recruiting players from the Brazilian team. Really, Brazil? It was a backwater. They didn't even speak English there. How did they even play quidditch there since the whole place was one big, wet jungle? He'd have to teach them everything.

Wait … was that Evans down there? Of course, here he was stuck in the last bloody row between a couple of sweaty Portuguese. James focused his omnioculars towards the aisle next to the railing that ran all the way around the tier. It really was Evans. Her face looked a bit puffy and tired, and what was she wearing? It was hot here, and she had some shawl over her arms and covering half her sundress so James could hardly see any skin. Ha, there was the reason why Evans had to stay covered up … Snape was right behind her. He was uglier than ever. What was she doing here with Snape, MacDonald and Wilkes? If Evans wanted to go to the World Cup, all she had to do was write him. With his connections, he could have gotten them excellent seats, and how could he forget the camping? James would be happy to share a tent with Evans, rather than the the other chasers from his team.

From his vantage point, James saw Snape put his slimy hand on Evans. This was so unfair! Rather than puking on the loudly cackling woman in front of him, James decided that this situation had to be remedied.

He stood and cast, "_Expelliarmus!" _while keeping his omnioculars focused on Snape.

Severus was listening to Lily complain that her feet were hurting, and replying that they only had three more sections to go, when he was knocked backwards into both the Wilkes. He felt his wand fly out of his sleeve holster and his eyes caught sight of it spinning end over end before it sailed over the railing. He presumed it would continue falling until it landed on the pitch. Lovely.

Lily was yelling his name, when he got hoisted aloft by the ankle and bodily smacked into her, knocking her down onto the stairs that led up to the seating in this section.

James was grinning at the Slytherin pile-up and barked out a laugh as Snape saw his wand drop over the rail, saying, "Look at his face," before casting his next spell.

One of Potter's teammates realized he was up to something immature and potentially embarrassing yet again, and asked him to stop. When Potter jerked his wand and laughed more, ignoring him, he looked downwards and saw a wizard in black being lifted in the air, right next to the safety railing. A number of people were yelling now, and he tried to get Potter to stop by reaching across to his wand hand, asking their beater on the other side to stop him.

Severus was stunned by getting knocked into Lily, and realized he was now being swung away from her and hurled facefirst into the top rail. MacDonald threw herself bodily between him and the rail, holding her hands out to stop him, while Severus cast the counter of _liberacorpus _on himself, hoping his mother's wand was up to that spell.

Even though Lily had an extreme pain in her lower back from the edge of a stair, she found she could not lie motionless as Severus swung towards mortal peril. She was not sure if she actually willed herself to do it, or something beyond her control flung her at Sev to grab onto him and then dig in her heels to try to drag him back. It hurt incredibly, she felt something pop inside her, and there was something warm and wet leaking down between her legs as she pulled, before Severus became a victim of gravity and fell.

James was horrified how badly the direction of his spell went because this clod of a beater the Broomfleet recruited grabbed hold of his wand hand while he was dangling Snivellus and knocked him into that idiot, MacDonald, who got in the way.

Malcolm got off the floor and got his wand out. He did not cast a spell until after he and Mary screamed as she was knocked into and over the rail. Leaning over dangerously himself, Malcolm slowed Mary's fall and kept his eyes and focus on her till she reached the ground without injury.

Lily stood transfixed, holding her breath while Malcolm continued to concentrate on a spell. She was afraid to move and look down for herself. His reaction was all she would need to know what happened to Mary. Her breathing and pain resumed when his shoulders dropped with a relieved sigh, and he turned to them to mention, "I have to get down there."

From his vantage point on the thin carpet at Lily's feet, Severus could feel it was wet with something. Knowing quidditch fans, he was probably better off not knowing.

By now, ushers were centering on them and fans were getting out of their seats. One of the staff was using a device to talk to someone else to check on Mary.

Afraid, Lily got his attention with a hissed, "Sev."

"Yes?"

"I … Could you look … I don't know ..."

"Where?"

"I might have wet myself, when I was pulling you," Lily whispered to him, hoping that's all it was. Her mum had warned her that her bathroom habits may change and there could be accidents, but Lily thought that was supposed to be much later. She was not going to go through three months of wetting her pants.

Severus was partially relieved that he may now know what liquid was soaking his clothes and hands, only because it was from Lily, rather than someone who had too much to drink before the snitch was even released. He would have preferred a spilled beverage though.

The fabric of the center of her flower print skirt was wetly clinging to her the front of her thighs, but the white fabric was tinged pink. Reluctantly, he touched her damp leg and then examined his fingers.

Unsure, he asked, "Could it be something else?"

"I don't kno … ugh," Lily felt a prolonged, harsh pain in her lower back.

"What's wrong?" Severus asked, then realized more of whatever it was was pouring out of Lily onto him. It was not blood.

Loudly, to stop these morons from crowding them, and to give him an opportunity to get up so he could be in a better position to help Lily, Severus announced, "We need to get my wife to a hospital."

Lily was pale and a sweat had broken out on her forehead. She knew something was truly wrong and the pain continued, barely ebbing than returning stronger. She grabbed at Severus as he stood. He was right, she needed a hospital. Now.

Someone instructed them to let go of each other so they could be apparated to the hospital by separate security guards, and Malcolm was told, "Stay here. We're having your wife brought up by broom. She's unhurt. We'll take you to the hospital after we have some questions answered."

Not quite believing them, Malcolm looked back down over the rail to make sure there were people with brooms getting Mary. He was impatient to see talk to her, but had to admit a broom was faster than all those stairs.

Afraid that he'd lost it forever, Severus mentioned, "My wand went over the rail too. The first spell that hit me was a disarming spell. It's ebony, thirteen and a half inches, with two bands of near identical interwoven designs on the handle."

Malcolm agreed while still keeping an eye over the activity below, "Yes, whoever cast the disarming charm, purposely knocked Snape into my wife and I, before lifting him and using his person as a weapon against his own wife, then swung him back to try to kill my wife."

A woman in a uniform robe instructed everyone to back away from Lily, then said, "I'll take you straight to the emergency ward of the local wizarding hospital, ma'am."

Lily saw another uniformed witch waving her hands at those around Severus before she got pulled away by the apparition.

Prior to following Lily to the hospital on the arm of another security witch, Severus looked up the stairs at a loudly complaining, familiar voice. James Potter. A group of men were bringing him down from wherever Potter had been waiting to ambush him. The word _crucio _and intent were in Severus' mind as the security witch apparated with him.

Obviously the half-witted Portguese had no idea what being a team meant as they dragged James down the stairs. Traitors. They were jealous of him. It was only a bit of a joke, and a few people had already screamed out that MacDonald was alright. What was the big deal? It was only Snape, and it certainly livened things up while they were waiting.

James was actually glad to see Snape look up at him. Now he'd know who made a fool of him again … James fell, screaming because he was suddenly in intense pain like he had never felt before. His entire body was aboil and perhaps exploding would bring him relief. It was not until it stopped that James could think and realized that he must have gotten c_ruciatus _ cast on him. Now, that slimy, dark wizard Snape was going to pay. He'd go to prison for the rest of his life. Wait, where'd he go? And what did they do to Evans?

Regulus Black was seated with Mrs. Crouch and his friend, Barty, a few rows behind and to the side of the British Minister of Magic. He was invited to the World Cup when it appeared Mr. Crouch, Barty's father, was too busy to come. They had arrived this morning, and if the game was short enough, they'd only need to camp here tonight.

Mrs. Crouch was being a bit of a bore since she was noting who she knew among the latest arrivals as being worthy of a better timed portkey than the Crouchs. He exchanged a glance with Barty as she hissed 'Malfoys'.

He voiced his opinion, "If they had to stay somewhere overnight, who do you think would have more luggage? Him or her?"

At least Barty found it funny, or at least he did because his mother didn't. Father had gotten them World Cup tickets because he had scored twelve OWLs, something not even father had done himself. Then he can't even be bothered coming. Nothing was ever good enough for Bartemius Crouch, even when his son got perfect scores in every subject. How Barty hated him.

Regulus was playing with his omnioculars and focused on his cousin, Narcissa. What the hell had she done to her hair now? At least she was dressed well, and wore enough jewelry to be able to buy a quidditch team.

A few of the security people that the Texans or Americans or wherever the name of Hades they were that they kept it so hot, were barging through the throng of people around the Minister.

Regulus noted that he turned and was pointing up this way. He lowered his omnioculars and looked around. These were not bad seats at all so it had to be someone important.

Some flunky of the Minister's ran ahead and addressed their group, "Where's Mr. Crouch?"

"My husband had to remain in London on Ministry business," Mrs. Crouch replied.

"Are any of his people around, Missus? A crazed Portuguese quidditch player attacked four of our citizens and knocked one right over the railing to fall onto the pitch. Her husband luckily saved her, but the Yanks are trying to figure out some of the details. The other witch that he attacked was pregnant, and they rushed her right to hospital with her husband."

"Portuguese?" Mrs. Crouch repeated. A quidditch match brought out the worst in some people. It's only a game, and it hadn't even begun yet.

"Yeah, who knows? Right, missus? They're all a bunch of hot-blooded lunatics down there."

Mrs. Crouch stood and Regulus gladly loaned her his omnioculars. People who worked for Mr. Crouch did not sit with him. Their seats would be way in the back, if not on the top tier above them.

"Ah, see that fellow there, with the straw hat? That is Alastor Gumboil. He works in my husband's department, Magical Law Enforcement."

"Yes, thank you for your assistance. I hope he can get back to the game without too much fuss."

James was escorted down the stairs, protesting he was going to miss the game and he had a ticket for a reserved seat. Though then when he saw Wilkes smooching MacDonald. What a man-whore. Obviously, there was no low a Slytherin would not sink to. Even though he was never fond of MacDonald, James felt that maybe he should warn her before she did something stupid. Slimy Slytherins should stick to their own kind.

If that was not nauseating enough, James recognized that Boil fellow from the Ministry, pretending he knew how to wear muggle clothes. Everyone knew only girls wore those kind of hats.

Simultaneously, they sneered at each other, "You!"

Then Alastor Gumboil continued, "He's no Portuguese. He's English. That's James Potter."

"Portuguese?" James exploded. "That is ridiculous. Do I speak in gibberish? Do I eat greasy sausages, morning, noon and night?"

"Wait, you attacked the Wilkes and Snapes?"

"So?" James replied, not catching the plurals. "Snape cast _cruciatus _on me."

"Shit," muttered one of the Texan wizards, as he examined the omnioculars. "He recorded the whole thing."

"Hey, those are mine!" James claimed.

"_Cruciatus_? There's no _cruciatus_," someone else disputed. "They were walking to their seats. None of them even knew you were up there when you attacked them."

"Not then. Later. When I came down the stairs, Snape cast a _cruciatus_ on me."

"You had already disarmed him."

"He got his wand back by then. How do you think he countered my spell?"

"We have his wand. Other than starting numerous fires, but Mr. Wilkes said he's a potions apprentice, his spells are as dull as dishwater."

"Then Wilkes cast it on me! It had to be one of them. They're Slytherins. Dark wizards."

"May I?" Alastor interrupted, "I've questioned this perpetrator before. He is prone to telling the most outrageous lies, and I think he could keep us here all afternoon, to ruin our enjoyment of the game, just to amuse himself."

"You're lying," James replied.

Ignoring the not so Portuguese quidditch player, Gumboil was given permission to speak. The British Minister sent him over, but at this point, they really did not need him. The absurdity of finding the whole incident recorded on the attacker's omnioculars was all they needed, besides having his entire quidditch team willing to be witness to this James Potter casting spells at hapless people as they tried to make their way to their seats.

"I first made this young man's acquaintance when he was a minor. He and his friends destroyed a muggle pub for fun, and coincidentally Mr. Snape's father, a muggle, was in it. Later, he and his friends lured six students, including these four to a werewolf during a full moon, resulting in Mrs. Wilkes getting infected, and another girl getting killed. When the evidence against Potter was circumstantial, criminal charges were not pressed against him, but he was expelled."

"I was not!"

"You were expelled from Hogwarts," Gumboil insisted.

"I was, but not for that."

"I was trying to make this quick. He was suspended, then when another student died under mysterious circumstances, and Potter was found to be withholding information that could have saved him, but chose instead to not care if another student was killed, he was expelled."

"Hey, Peter was my friend!"

"Yes, and you knew he was an illegal animagus, which may have been helpful information when he went missing. Oh, Potter's an animagus too. A stag.

"Rather than drawing this out for his entertainment, let's continue. Potter was then expelled, and more people were killed while he had the flimsiest alibis. His accomplices were either imprisoned or killed, leaving him alone to then start playing professional quidditch. After attacking Hogwarts students at a game in which he was supposed to be playing, Potter could no longer find a team in Britain, so went to play in Portugal."

"I could find a team, but Braga Broomfleet offered what I wanted," James disputed. Gumboil had no idea about how profesional quidditch players changed teams. James could play chaser on any team he wanted.

"Except lie for you when you try to kill the same people again."

"I don't need them to lie for me. No one got hurt. It was all a prank. Didn't you hear people laughing? They were cheering when I turned that greasy git upside down."

"That was screams of horror," disagreed one of the security wizards.

"No one got hurt? You knocked a pregnant witch into the stairs. She's at hospital now."

"I can't help it if someone got clumsy," James replied. He didn't see any pregnant cows waddling about earlier.

The only satisfying thing to Gumboil was this was not England. He may never see James Potter again, and that was fine with him. Priviledged pricks were a blight on their country, and it was bloody difficult to tell them apart from the supposed bad guys. His transfer to become a hit wizard could not come bloody fast enough.

*******************

Remus was home with his parents the next day when the newspaper was delivered. He had been sad that he could not go to the World Cup with Prongs, but there was no helping how he felt just after the full moon. Taking a portkey, then camping for a couple days, would be too much. He hoped to hear from James tomorrow on how it went, but at the very least he would know Greece had won. After four hours of brilliant play by both teams. Darn. He missed a good one. Maybe next time, it would not be scheduled so close to the full moon.

He did a doubletake as he turned the page. There was a photo of James, looking very angry. He attacked Mary and Malcolm Wilkes, knocked Mary Wilkes over the stands to plummet to the pitch, but she was unharmed because she was saved by her husband? If that was not something that said James had lost his mind, he also attacked Severus and Lily Snape, the former year's head boy and head girl of Hogwarts? Mrs. Snape was in critical condition in hospital? Did James throw her off the stands too?

*******************

For over a day, Severus was left in limbo, waiting for Lily to recover sufficiently to get a better diagnosis. The baby was already dead. There had already been too much damage to keep it within Lily, and it was too little and underdeveloped to live outside of her.

He was troubled that he did not feel more strongly about it, or her. It had been a girl. Severus knew that he was capable of grief from his mother's death. Why didn't he feel as strongly about Lily's baby? He could make himself feel worse by picturing her as an eight year old with red hair at the playground. Imagining she would look and laugh just like Lily had at the age when he first met her.

Was it because he was so angry at himself for not casting the killing curse at James Potter? That's what he should have cast, if he was going to cast anything. Until Potter was dead, he was going to keep turning up everywhere and ruining his life. There was also still Black. Severus still had not done anything about him. He had no idea where he was since he escaped from Azkaban. Black may have even had been with Potter yesterday. Severus was doing a horrible job of protecting Lily.

Wilkes said he'd let Lily's mother know about what happened, and Severus would get more information to her as it became available. The Wilkes were able to trade another two people for a later portkey, and were leaving about now.

Mrs. Evans could get on an airplane, but Severus thought that would still take a long time. They might even be back in England by the time she got here. His knowledge of muggle travel was terrible, unless it involved a train schedule.

When Lily opened her eyes, she found Severus drooling on her hand. He had fallen asleep on the chair beside her bed, probably holding her hand.

If Sev had fallen asleep, she was afraid that she had been here a while. Lily could remember some things. The quidditch stadium obviously, someone attacked them … who? Could it have been Death Eaters? Were there more attacks coordinated throughout the stadium on other muggleborns? Was the Dark Mark made visible over the pitch after they left?

Lily could really think of no other reason for the four of them to get attacked like that. They weren't speaking loudly. They weren't picking on anyone or anything. Not the Americans, Texas, Greece or Brazil.

She also remembered the pain, all the liquid that came out of her, then she started bleeding … the bleeding started almost as soon as they apparated here. Then a woman brought Sev here, and they got her lying down and changed, and the pain just wouldn't stop. Then what? With her free hand, Lily felt her stomach. It felt flatter … maybe. For a long time, she kept feeling her stomach to determine if it was getting bigger, now maybe it was not as big as it was, but it was still somewhat rounded. She pressed it a little and it had some give. Not like before when it was solid and round, to prove it was not just a bit more fat on her midsection.

Panic. Was the baby out of her? There was nothing around here to show there was a baby. No little cot with plastic sides, but it would be way too small. Did they have one of those incubators that Lily had seen on television where the nurses handled it through gloves on the side, or some magical equivalent to keep it warm and breathing?

She was about to wake Sev and ask him, then stopped. What if something happened to it? Would he blame her for wanting to come here to see the World Cup? Lily knew Sev was not keen on coming here.

He also did not say much about the baby, except smirk when her mother suggested they make Petunia's room into the nursery, and could overhear Petunia's shrieks over the telephone, even though he was not the one with the earpiece to his head. Sev may not be joining in with the planning, but he did show he cared. At night, he usually slept with at least one hand, if not both, on her stomach. Sometimes during the day, he'd rub her belly. There was also those odd looks he would give her bare stomach, like he was trying to see how another person could be inside of her.

Lily could not stand not knowing anymore, and shook his shoulder, calling, "Sev."

*******************

Later in the day, Albus brought a copy of the paper to the Shrieking Shack along with some other supplies for Horace.

Unable to comprehend the senseless violence, Albus was bemoaning to his friend, "I cannot believe it. What could he have been thinking?"

Horace looked up from the article and agreed, "I know. If Wilkes had let her hit the ground at full speed, he could have been very wealthy."

*******************

Malcolm had returned and gone back to England multiple times, carrying news between Lily and her mother. Since she was improving, and the hospital kept giving release times such as 'as soon as tomorrow' for multiple days, the idea of booking a portkey while pretending Mrs. Evans was a close to squib witch, complete with wand to weigh at the Ministry was deemed unnecessarily risky.

Mary returned for longer periods of time. Initially, she had been miffed that Lily had hidden her pregnancy from her best friend for so long, however she had forgiven her. Unable to have children herself, she had thought she could be something of a favorite aunt. It was going to be a little girl too. Finding out how they dealt with criminals around here was heartening because James Potter would never ruin their lives again, but it still did not bring back Helen or Lily's baby.

Lily would be free to travel in a day or two. She still could not believe James Potter had attacked them, or maybe not that, but he could be so vindictive after all this time. What made him so intrisically evil?

Neither Malcolm nor Severus understood what an electric chair was, except they got the idea it was a muggle invention meant to deal with the harshest sorts of criminals. Sev at least understood the danger of electricity to a person's body.

Potter's parents were attempting to get him transferred back to England because at least there, at worse he would only go to Azkaban for a short while. The local laws here were quite different about baby killing and attempted murder. Even if Mary was a werewolf, they considered it attempted murder, since she had not been transformed or posing a danger when Potter attacked her.

Lily was unfamiliar with the term 'Texas Justice', but she considered that it might strike some fear in people back home if the Ministry adopted a stricter method of dealing with criminals, rather than only locking up those that did not bribe or joke their way out of trouble.

*******************

Phi was moping about. She had been kept fed regular by the female here, but it was not his person or his person's mate that carried her egg inside her body. People were so impractical. This nest seemed nice. The egg could be kept here. Even in winter, the inside was warm.

The female tried to speak to her, but Phi did not understand a word she said. Phi understood that she was being fed quite well. She got liver here quite a bit than she did at that dangerous stone building in the North.

She felt a surge of warmth when her person and his mate appeared next to the hedge, where many little birds lived. If he was going to be gone so long, a good wizard should take his familiar with him.

Severus was mildly annoyed when Phi swooped down and landed on his shoulder. She was not supposed to do that around here. He sensed that she knew, however she had been lonely without him around for days. It had not even been a week since they left. Animals, even familiars, could not tell time the same way people could.

Mrs. Evans had been expecting them and spent the afternoon watching for them to appear. She opened the back door, ran over to her daughter and embraced her. With the uncertainty of what was going on, she had wanted to fly to the United States, but was afraid she'd miss them, or Lily would be released from their hospital and they'd have to wait for her to arrive. There might also be trouble getting back home with them, being a foreign country with different rules, especially for their kind. She was so happy that she finally got to hold her daughter again.

Author's Note: And that's that, without an epilogue naming everyone's children.

AN: James Potter knows next to nothing about Brazil. He may know it is in South America.

AN: I took some artistic license because I have no clue how marriage licenses are processed in the UK.

AN: Camping Malfoys?!? Not unless there's one heck of a party after the match. _Morsmordre_ anyone?


End file.
